Book Review

Beethoven for a Later Age: The Journey of a String Quartet by Edward Dusinberre, pub. Faber and Faber.

“Beethoven’s sixteen string quartets are some of the most extraordinary and challenging pieces of music ever written. They have inspired artists of all kinds – not only musicians – and have been subject to endless reinterpretation. What does it feel like to be a musician taking on these iconic works? And how do the four string players who make up a quartet interact, both musically and personally?

The Takács is one of the world’s pre-eminent string quartets. Performances of Beethoven have shaped their work together for over forty years. Using the history of both the Takács Quartet and the Beethoven quartets as the backbone to his story, Edward Dusinberre, first violinist of the Takács since 1993, recounts the exhilarating challenge of tackling these pieces.”

The dust jacket notes for this book pretty well sum it up; a fascinating look inside the life of a major string quartet plus a history of Beethoven’s composition of these wonderful pieces, all written in engaging prose that does not assume the reader is a musical expert. This reader at least thoroughly enjoyed Dusinberre’s book.

And the title? Beethoven is reputed to have said of the Opus 59 quartets “They are not for you, but for a later age!”

Alan Bellamy