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Enescu: String Octet, Piano Quintet on CD

Romanian composer George Enescu was a child prodigy, and in October 1888, aged seven, become the youngest student ever admitted to the Vienna Conservatory (and the first non-Austrian), where he graduated at the age of twelve. In addition to his career as a composer, Enescu was also an acclaimed conductor and violinist. He made his American debut in 1923 conducting the Philadelphia Orchestra, and frequently conducted both the New York Philharmonic and the Orchestre Symphonique de Paris. Enescu made numerous recordings as a violinist, of his own works and those of others: His 1949 recording of the Bach Sonatas and Partitas was very highly regarded, and as a teacher (at Mannes School of Music in New York) his students included Yehudi Menuhin, Christian Ferras, Ivry Gitlis, Arthur Grumiaux and Ida Haendel among many others). Enescu composed his Octet for Strings at the age of nineteen, taking a year and a half to complete, due to the complexity of the piece. The first performance was cancelled when, after 5 rehearsals, impresario edouard Colonne removed it from the programme as 'too risky'. The performers have chosen to complete the album with Enescu's early Piano Quintet, composed some four years before the Octet, during his time at the Paris Conservatoire. The work shows the young Enescu's reverence for his hero Brahms throughout, but also demonstrates his extraordinary command of form and texture at such an early age.