The violin virtuoso Heinrich Anton Hoffmann (1770-1842) was a member of the Kurmainzer Hofkapelle until 1799. Later he moved to Frankfurt, where he became concertmaster of the theatre orchestra and vice music director. His string quartets Op.3 (1795) astound with their modernity, which despite their proximity to the models of the Viennese Classical period already show the style of later decades. They are characterised by formal variability and harmonic flexibility with a special preference for chromaticism. The Ensemble Alte Musik Koln, playing on historical instruments, lets us discover this amazing Beethoven contemporary.