BEETHOVEN-HERSANT
“The Starry Sky”
“All men have stars, but they are not the same things for different people. For some, who are travellers, the stars are guides. For others they are no more than little lights in the sky. For others, who are scholars, they are problems. For my businessman they were wealth. But all these stars are silent. You, you alone will have the stars as no one else has them… […] You, only you, will have stars that can laugh!”
The Little Prince, Antoine de Saint-Exupéry.
If the pieces recorded here owe their existence to the stars, the development of the disc itself is a great meeting of the stars. Perhaps we hear them laughing at the opportunity to travel between neighbouring galaxies…
Our wonderful experience of playing the complete Beethoven’s quartets live in concert, our radiant encounter with Philippe Hersant, whose fourth string quartet we have the honour of premiering on record, our truly enriching residence at the Queen Elisabeth Musical Chapel of Belgium, and the precious relationship that quickly grew with luthier Charles Coquet, leading us to play on a quartet of instruments… these are all lively and significant realities from a moment in our life as quartet musicians which we wanted to bring together in a single story.
The purpose of this recording is not to freeze shooting stars… It seemed important to us, in this fleeting life, to take the time to lift our gaze, because it is the starry skies that we cannot fail to contemplate and thank.
Girard Quartet
Quatuor Girard