Prologue

Arranging popular repertoire for a different instrumentation has always been common practice in western classical music. From symphony to piano reduction, opera aria to instrumental string quartet, the re-setting of the score often illuminates different colours and nuances hidden in the original instrumentation. 

Paul Wranitzky was Haydn's favorite Vienna Konzertmaister* and in this exciting project we dive deep into the unusual journey that he took in re-colouring Haydn's masterpieces - his three Op. 71 quartets, expanding them into nonets, alongside music by his contemporaries W.A. Mozart, F.Rosinack and Michael Haydn. We will open our journey with Chaos from The Creation, and bring it to a close with Haydn's last, the Unfinished quartet, Op. 103.