Gil Shaham / Paul Meyer / Jian Wang / Myung-Whun Chung MESSIAEN Quatuor pour la fin du temps

How four solid musicians of international repute can produce so blemished a recording of Messiaen’s chamber music masterpiece is anyone’s guess, let alone approve it for release. The most glaring inaccuracies pockmark the serene final movement. Here Myung-Whun Chung misreads each 32nd note as a 16th. Did the composer really want this? Gil Shaham’s intonation is not what it should be, and neither is Paul Meyer’s. The latter’s long sustained E-sharps in the unaccompanied third movement, along with the low B-sharp at measure eight, will make sensitive ears wince. Long before this disc was released in the U.S., one of my European colleagues drew attention to cellist Jian Wang’s early start of the glissando in the fourth movement’s third-to-last measure, which throws the ensemble off. In the fifth movement, Wang prepares for high notes with pronounced left-hand shifts that often telegraph the pitch a split second before it’s supposed to be heard. Tashi’s Fred Sherry, by contrast, controls his instrument to the fullest degree, and achieves a more sustained, singing line. To my taste, the pronounced, unwritten ritard at the climax one measure before letter D robs the subsequent “ppp subito” effect of its hushed devastation. The fiery, unison sixth movement aggressively barnstorms when it should joyously dance, and Chung’s handling of Messiaen’s bird-like flourishes lacks sparkle and definition. Fortunately, Tashi’s infinitely more characterful, soul-searching, and accurate 1975 RCA recording is still available. Maybe RCA will even remaster it for its High Performance series: hint, hint, nudge, nudge. But if you happen upon an open copy of this DG release, remove the booklet and read the extraordinary interview with cellist Etienne Pasquier, one of the four musicians who gave the work’s first performance in a German prisoner-of-war camp. (Jed Distler)