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Concerto - Fantasy - Blues

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Works for a viola quartet by Bartók, Bowen, Norton, Piazzolla, Telemann, Weinzierl
Tertis Viola Ensemble

Four strings making up a quartet - there’s nothing unusual in that. But the ensemble takes on a very unusual hue when the four instruments concerned have identical pitch, four violas in this case.
Armed with the idea for this unusual combination, four members of the Munich Philharmonic set out on the “viola quartet” adventure. Of course, the original repertoire for this instrumentation is limited. The only two original works on the debut CD of the group are the “Nachtstücke” (“Night Pieces”) by Max von Weinzierl and the “Fantasie Quartet” by York Bowen. By contrast, the original string quartet version of Astor Piazzolla’s famous “Four for Tango” has been rearranged for four violas.
The remaining compositions on this CD might not strictly be regarded as “adaptations”: the concertos by Georg Friedrich Telemann, written originally for four violins, are played a fifth lower here. A selection of duos from the “44 Duos for Two Violins” follows the arrangement for two violas by Béla Bartók’s son Peter.