Three string quartets (2005)

"Hummel only wrote three string quartets, and here they are, played by the Delmé Quartet with a nice appreciation of their nature. Hummel wrote them by 1804, therefore in the knowledge of effectively all Haydn's quartets and of Beethoven's Op. 18 set. The most remarkable is No. 1, which takes note of his great predecessor and great rival in several ways. There is the skilled contrapuntal play of the four parts, the exploration of novel textures, the melodic liveliness and grace. More specifically, Hummel has noted how Haydn developed new and often wittily deceptive key relationships. Hummel is, of course, neither Haydn nor Beethoven. He lacks Haydn's wonderful ingenuities, the playing with the listener so that things so often turn out to be quite different from what they first seemed; he lacks Beethoven's dynamic potency. But these are graceful and inventive works, very well written, belonging to the Viennese tradition, easy on the ear, fresh in invention and refreshingly unpretentious." (Gramophone)