I'm familiar with shostakovich' symphonies, but I had never heard his string quartet music. I bought this cd tonight, and it's been in the player since I came home! What passion! what technique! bravo Emerson String Quartet!

By FAR the worst popular recording of this piece in existence. The cellist very rarely (that's being generous) decides that BALANCE is an important part of ensemble playing. The fundamental sounds of the instruments never blends, not atypical to other Emerson recordings... Another Emerson recording where poor personal aesthetics interfere with the true musical gestures of the piece (if you're not sure what I'm on about, check out them doing the last movement of Bartok's 4th string quartet.

Yes, its only a 20 minute disc but for 7 bucks its well worth it because the Emerson 4tet does such a great job on the performance! You can hear all the parts very clearly (I've heard some recordings before that were a bit muddy). The play it with a lot of depth. The sadness & the irony is all there as it should be. I've heard four other recordings of the 8th & this is by far the best recording technically (on engineering as well as performance) & emotionally. Very good liner notes (an interview) as well. If you want Shostakovich's 8th 4tet, you cannot go wrong with this excellent recording! A must buy!

A beautiful and stiring rendition of the Eighth Quartet. If this recording does not move you, you have no soul.

It is not clear to me why this CD was released. I was not familiar with the piece when I bought it and so I was very surpised that the entire recording came in at around twenty minutes. No sooner have you put it in the CD player and its over. The recording is fine but there are better values out there for your money.

worked good for 1 tank of gas, filled with gas & it would not start,called to get it fixed, called 4 phone #, 0ne said it would take 3 months to fix,the other three told me it was a piece of junk, called mtd back, & they are going to send me a new one, hope it works better than the first one.