With their debut release on Virgin Classics in 2005 of Beethoven’s Quartets Opp.59/1 & 95, the Artemis Quartet launched, with promising success, a full Beethoven Quartet cycle for the label. The recording was greeted with great enthusiasm worldwide (in France, CHOC of the Year, Monde de la Musique - Diapason d’Or).

This release of Beethoven’s ‘Razumovsky’ & Quartet 18/4 is the Artemis’ much awaited second step in the projected complete Beethoven cycle - this time in its new grouping with new members Gregor Sigl and Friedemann Weigle, which we discover for the first time in an all-quartet programme, further to their recent release of Schubert’s String Quintet with Truls Mørk.

‘The Artemis String Quartet makes chamber music spectacular: the quartet's playing is polished and precise but at the same time spontaneous, fresh and explosive as though the music is being improvised on the spot. Even the physical motions involved with the bowing are beautifully choreographed to reflect the mood of the music.’ The Enquirer