A feast for fans of English twentieth century composers, this collection of British piano quartets by the Ames Piano Quartet is a marvel and a wonder, a marvel that an ensemble from Iowa can so magnificently capture the quintessentially English quality of the music and a wonder that so much first-rate chamber music remains so far beyond the range of the standard repertoire. Only Frank Bridge's Phantasy and William Walton's quartets are remotely well known, while the works here by Alexander Campbell Mackenzie, Herbert Howells, Charles Villiers Stanford, and Gordon Jacob are nearly unknown except to the hardest of hard-core Anglophiles. But whatever the work, no matter how recherché the repertoire, the members of the Ames Quartet put their minds, their hearts, and their backs into the music and present amazingly persuasive performances. There are elements of Brahms in the quartets of Mackenzie and Stanford and echoes of Vaughan Williams in Howells and Jacob, but through the strength and conviction of the Ames' playing, each work sounds cogently argued, compellingly shaped, and totally convincing. Anyone who enjoys the robustly melodic, powerfully harmonic, muscularly rhythmic, and tenderly radiant music of twentieth century England will enjoy this two-disc set. Albany's sound is rich and warm, but just a tad too distant. ~ James Leonard, All Music Guide
