The first volume of Beethoven's String Quartets survey by Narratio Quartet comprises the Six Quartets opus 18. The Quartet play on period instruments and also assume a radical position towards performance practice including the revival of long-time neglected attitudes: a more flexible concept of tempo, a restrained and cautious use of vibrato, the portamento as the main expressive tool. Two more boxes will follow: Middle String Quartets in late 2024 and Late String Quartets on Spring 2025.

Viola de Hoog: I have often wondered which of the "great spirits" might provide a new impulse and a different direction for what we call classical music in this early part of the twenty-first century. Narratio Quartet have been immersed in all of Beethoven's string quartets for over fifteen years now. We experience time and again how Beethoven explored and then overcame the limits of the Classical style and the instrumental difficulties that were prevalent at the start of the nineteenth century. What we hear has been enriched by the passing of two centuries and the gaining of wider experience. Progress indeed, might be your first thought, but perhaps we have also lost something along the way? The ability to feel how groundbreaking and visionary this music was in those days. My colleagues and I feel that using instruments that are comparable to those of the time has helped us enormously in getting somewhat closer to the surprise, the bewilderment and the rapture that the musicians in Schuppanzigh's quartet must have felt when they first came face to face with the newest and most innovative chamber music of the day.