The Heath Quartet convey the [Schoenberg’s] often intimate intensity with great sensitivity, and Carolyn Sampson’s warm lyricism is ideal both in the forward-looking finale, and in the slow movement where Schoenberg’s grief at the tragic events unfolding around him finds its deepest expression.

the marvellous thing about this performance [of the Berg] is the way the Heaths balance absolute textual fidelity with a sense of spontaneity – the expressive portamenti in the opening pages are a case in point, as are the subtle variations in vibrato (one aspect which Berg doesn’t prescribe!) throughout…In the Schoenberg, Sampson and the quartet are ever-sensitive to the mystical beauty of Georg’s poetry, painting the ‘hazy vapours’ and ‘holy fire’ in the most vivid of colours as this superb album draws to a transcendent close.

the Berg [is] spiky and prophetic, Schoenberg’s second quartet, composed as his marriage hit choppy water, a masterpiece of austerity and torment. The Heath and, in the Schoenberg, a deeply lyrical Sampson capture the extraordinary intensity in both.