Talk:Budapest String Quartet

Summary
I have added a summary of Nat Brandt's book and hope that readers find it useful. Budhen (talk) 16:08, 4 February 2008 (UTC)


 * Yes, it's extremely useful; thank you for posting it. I wonder whether the book includes a discography? Milkunderwood (talk) 16:26, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

quartet's name; and dates of recordings
I have a number of recordings of the Budapest, on LP and on CD. With very few exceptions the group is universally called the Budapest String Quartet, and I suggest the name of the article be changed unless someone may have a differing source considered more authoritative. It's possible the original group used the name "Budapest Quartet", and that some time after the Russians began joining the word "String" became incorporated into their name. In any case it's the Russian group rather than their predecessors that cut recordings and gave many live appearances, and were extremely famous in their time.

Many but not at all recordings specify the session dates in the liner notes, and I think it would be useful to provide the year of each, where known. In some cases the specific month and date are also provided, as well as the recording venue, but I think including this detailed information would make the article too complicated, particularly since many recordings as finally issued were played over a period of time with several different takes that were spliced together.

I plan to go ahead and start inputting years where known (and I think adding a few recordings not yet listed); but will leave the group's name alone, pending the responses of interested editors.


 * Edit: I ended up adding a ton of recordings and CD reissues, primarily in the Columbia section. Some of the sources were from my own collection, and others mostly from old Schwann catalogs (going back to 1966), or a few from Amazon.fr, etc (the United Archives listings). Milkunderwood (talk) 14:16, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

I invite any and all discussion of these suggestions. Milkunderwood (talk) 23:03, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

At 08:46, 3 April 2010 (see history page) I deleted the notes from below the Columbia recordings. Here is the text deleted:
 * Columbia Records in America picked up work on the Budapest Beethoven cycle which had been begun in Europe by HMV. Some of these early Columbia versions have been reissued by Sony Classical Masterworks Heritage as follows:
 * - *Beethoven: Quartets Nos. 1, 4, 6, 9 and 11 (MH2K 62870; two CDs), and Nos. 12, 14, 15 and 16 (MH2K 62873; two CDs; with the Minuet from the Quartet No. 5).(Roisman-Schneider-Kroyt-Schneider)
 * - Recordings made at Coolidge Auditorium of Library of Congress, 1951-53. In these recordings four of the Stradivari of Gertrude Clarke Whittall are played, as follows: Roisman (Betts Violin); Gorodetzky (Castelbarco Violin); Kroyt (Cassavetti Viola); Schneider (Castelbarco Violoncello).
 * - * Beethoven: Complete cycle of Beethoven Quartets (Roisman-Gorodetzky-Kroyt-Schneider).
 * - * Mozart: The Six Quartets dedicated to Haydn (K 387, 421, 428, 458, 464 and 465).
 * - Later recordings
 * - * Schubert: Quintet in A major op 114 (Trout), (Roisman-Kroyt-Schneider) with Mieczysław Horszowski (piano) and George Moleux (bass) (Philips 10" LP SBR 6220)
 * - * Beethoven: A cycle of Beethoven quartets was produced in 1957 in stereo to replace the mono 1951-53 version.
 * - * Schubert: Quintet in A major op 114 (Trout), (Roisman-Kroyt-Schneider) with Mieczysław Horszowski (piano) and George Moleux (bass) (Philips 10" LP SBR 6220)
 * - * Beethoven: A cycle of Beethoven quartets was produced in 1957 in stereo to replace the mono 1951-53 version.

This deleted section contains some information that will still be useful, but it now needs to be edited and reorganized. I think the first sentence is useful, concerning the switch from HMV to Columbia in the midst of the Beethoven cycle. But all of the Columbia notes duplicating listed items can be omitted.

I'm curious about the Philips 10" LP, with George Moleux on bass, because on the (undated) Columbia/Sony, with Roisman, Kroyt, Schneider and Horszowski, Julius Levine is credited on bass. I wonder if the Philips might be a live performance; Philips was a BMG company, unaffiliated with Columbia, so that in itself seems strange.


 * Hey, I found it--Georges E Moleux--but on a reprint label, not Philips. Look at this:

http://www.amazon.fr/Schubert-Quintets-Budapest-String-Quartet/dp/B0013ISU9G/ref=sr_1_22?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1270296327&sr=8-22
 * and flip to the back picture. Milkunderwood (talk) 12:24, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

We should also leave in--and expand--the discussion concerning their live performances at Library of Congress. Some of these were issued on CD on the Bridge label, and I also have an Italian label, Intaglio, with Beethoven's Kakadu trio Op 121a, and Schubert's Trout crediting George Szell, both dated 16 May 1946 at LofC. I'm aware of other live performances, including on an Italian label, Documents, crediting a 1959 New York performance of Schubert's D 810, Dvorak's Op 81 with Arthur Balsam, and Mozart's K 428 & K 458. I'm sure there are others, but I don't have the information.

About the group's name, virtually every place I've seen it written--not only on LPs and CDs but also in Schwann Opus--it's always given as the Budapest String Quartet, and I'm more convinced than ever that the name of the article needs to be changed to reflect this. However, I don't know how to access an article name for editing. Then the disambiguation page will also need to be fixed. Milkunderwood (talk) 09:45, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

I have now "Moved" the article to its corrected name, fixed the disambiguation page, and made a few changes in the lines above the Contents box. Milkunderwood (talk) 10:50, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

links added in History of the Quartet section
I added links to a bunch of names, many of which are red rather than blue, indicating no WP articles. If it looks too ugly, go ahead and take them out. But my own preference would be to leave them there, if for no other reason than to suggest to other users that at least creating a stub would be useful. Milkunderwood (talk) 13:40, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

organization of article
I have no idea whether Wikipedia is supposed to have some sort of standardized format for articles on music or musicians, but it occurs to me it might be more intuitive and make more sense for the History of the Quartet section to follow Members, coming before Recordings.

Comments? Milkunderwood (talk) 07:47, 4 April 2010 (UTC)


 * Well, being convinced that History really does belong above Recordings, I went ahead and moved them.


 * I also deleted the Notes section, since they all referred to the brief discussion that I had earlier removed--see above in this Discussion page--and the Notes section was now empty. Milkunderwood (talk) 20:40, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

I am a bit late I know but I am astonished that History should ever have been placed after Recordings. In Wiki the general principle is to put summary information as early as possible, leaving details to later. Recordings are a large collection of details, not suitable for reading from beginning to end, whereas History is primarily made for reading sequentially. So the present relationship is correct. Budhen (talk) 12:27, 1 April 2015 (UTC)

adding personnel where known
I have the Biddulph Lab 120/1; the liner notes say "Some of these [1936] Brahms recordings ... where Ipolyi was still present ... [replaced by] Boris Kroyt ..."

But it doesn't specify who was on which ones. Milkunderwood (talk) 23:38, 4 April 2010 (UTC)

Inline references
Added proper inline refs. Budhen (talk) 21:40, 7 June 2012 (UTC)
 * I will try to review the article later. I have, of course, seen that you've been busy. Many thanks.--Bbb23 (talk) 21:43, 7 June 2012 (UTC)

== Recordings and discography sequenced by composer (Youngrok Lee's Classical Music page): Permission to use ==

Mon 5/26/2014 youngrok.lee@gmail.com Budapest String Quartet discography Dear Mr. Lee: I want to both thank and congratulate you for your excellent and thorough discography for the Budapest String Quartet. From time to time I have done some work on the [English] Wikipedia entry for the BSQ, adding some information from CDs I have access to, and also from Nat Brandt’s 1993 book Con Brio. (I did not originate the article, or set up its arrangement.) This email is to request permission to incorporate your much more extensive discographic entries into the Wikipedia article, as I may have time to work on it. Of course since editing Wikipedia is open and free to anyone, there is no reason why you may not do so yourself, if you might have any such inclination. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budapest_String_Quartet With gratitude, Milkunderwood (my Wikipedia username)


 * Fri 5/30/2014
 * From: Youngrok Lee
 * Re: Budapest String Quartet discography
 * thanks for saying well of mine.
 * OK, my pleasure if you'll do so. I don't have 'Con Brio', so the abbreviation in Wikipedia was very useful because I only have 1959 article by Joseph Wechsberg in the Beethoven LP box.  As you know, the wiki article can make it clear who played the second chair in my discography.
 * Best regards, Youngrok Lee
 * Seoul, Korea

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Spelling of First Violinist's Name
On all the old Columbia record labels, the First Violinist's name is spelled with 2 Ns: "Roismann". Yet throughout this article, it is spelled with 1 N: "Roisman". Does anyone have any evidence that he changed the spelling of his name somewhere along the line, or is this an error that needs to be corrected? This YouTube video of their 1949 Schubert Trout recording includes quite a few pictures of the record labels: Schubert / Budapest Quartet / M Horszowski, 1949: Trout Quintet, Op. 114 (Forellen) --MAGoldberg (talk) 03:22, 23 September 2017 (UTC)
 * The violinist’s 1974 obituary in the New York Times spells it “Roisman”. https://nytimes.com/1974/10/10/archives/joseph-roisman-violinist-74-dies-member-of-budapest-string-quartet.html


 * Since he was known throughout most of his professional career as "Josef Roismann" and the Americanization to "Joseph Roisman" apparently occurred fairly late in his life, would it be appropriate to provide both spellings: "Josef Roismann (Joseph Roisman)" or the other way around? Users could then use both spellings to search for additional biographical information and recordings.

The major source for this detailed account of the Budapest Quartet's later US-based career would appear to be Nat Brandt's 1993 book "Con Brio". Shouldn't it have been pointed out that Brandt was the son in law of the Quartet's viola player, Boris Kroyt?Delahays (talk) 18:21, 12 November 2022 (UTC)