Shostakovich Chamber Symphonies “The Barshai Arrangements”

The eighth quartet has been over recorded, but this account is one to reckon with. The tenth quartet is even finer: Van Alphen searches out the ambivalence of its pensive opening Moderato and powers through the Allegretto furioso, the passacaglia slow movement evinces an elegiac restraint while momentum in the finale in intently controlled so that the end acknowledges its beginning with an appropriately wistful irony.
Richard Whitehouse – Gramophone

Shostakovich Chamber Symphonies “The Barshai Arrangements”

The eighth quartet has been over recorded, but this account is one to reckon with. The tenth quartet is even finer: Van Alphen searches out the ambivalence of its pensive opening Moderato and powers through the Allegretto furioso, the passacaglia slow movement evinces an elegiac restraint while momentum in the finale in intently controlled so that the end acknowledges its beginning with an appropriately wistful irony.
Richard Whitehouse – Gramophone