new Septet is a bear hug of a piece, wrapping a muscular piano trio around a strutting string quartet. As the bold phrases flow back and forth, the two ensembles dance in a powerful, exhilarating ...

While Penderecki’s intimate relationship with string instruments is well known, his output for string quartet per se is curious, not least because of its brevity. The first two quartets (1960 and 1968 ...