This recording by the splendid Gabrieli String Quartet makes a welcome return to the catalogue, and now at ‘Classics’ price. There is little competition for this programme.

The well-known British string quartet was founded in 1967 by Kenneth Sillito, who led the ensemble for some twenty years before passing the responsibility to John Georgiadis, at which point the Quartet entered into an exclusive contract with Chandos and made a number of fine recordings. It toured widely abroad and in the UK and was noted for its well-balanced performances. ‘I know this is a disc to be enjoyed again and again. The sound is simply flawless’, wrote the Newcastle Evening Chronicle.

Mendelssohn wrote his first two string quartets before his twenty-first birthday and they are typical of the mastery with which Mendelssohn approached the romantic style prevailing in the early nineteenth century.