Rosebud String Quartet | Haydn Op. 77, No. 1

Like most of his contemporaries, Joseph Haydn usually published his string quartets in groups of six. Several references to his work on a quartet opus, dating from early 1799, support the assumption that Haydn began Op. 77 with the intention of constructing a normal six-part set, but he discontinued the project. Conventional wisdom has held that Haydn was perhaps too preoccupied with large-scale works (The Seasons in 1799, his last Te Deum in 1800, and the Schöpfungsmesse in 1801) to complete the quartets, a hypothesis that gains credibility when one considers that he was then nearly 70 years old. However, the noted Haydn scholar H. C. Robbins Landon has argued persuasively that Haydn bid farewell to the string quartet—a genre he is often credited as having created—for the same reason that he abandoned composition of piano concerti and operas: the appearance of similar works by a talented younger colleague.

Many commentators have reveled in the Mozartean clarity, precision, and classic symmetry of form exhibited in the Op. 77 quartets, while others have found in them aspects that seem to presage Beethoven’s style. However, to players and listeners familiar with the entirety of Haydn’s chamber music, they remain unmistakably vintage Haydn, full of the surprising and unexpected beauties that place them among the very finest quartet productions of all composers.

Rosebud String Quartet | Haydn Op. 77 & Mozart K. 614

The Rosebud String Quartet was formed in 2013 at the inaugural Rosebud Chamber Music Festival, an annual summer chamber music showcase in rural Alberta. Comprised of principal players from the Edmonton Symphony and the orchestras of the Canadian Opera Company and National Ballet of Canada, the RSQ is one of Canada’s most dynamic ensembles with a unique voice and a deep love for the music of Haydn.

This recording brings together three great, late works by the acknowledged masters of Viennese classicism, Mozart and Haydn, and on it displays the Rosebud String Quartet’s remarkable chemistry and depth.