CD: Carter: String Quartets Nos 1 & 5, Pacifica Quartet

Considering how much third-rate music has been included in Naxos's American Classics series, Elliott Carter has so far been poorly served by the budget-price label. But in the year of the composer's 100th birthday, this - the first of two discs that will include all five of Carter's string quartets - could be the start of a major addition to his discography. The Pacifica Quartet have made something of a speciality of these works - they gave a complete cycle of them at the 2003 Edinburgh festival - and their performances of the First and the Fifth convey a sense of total familiarity and assured understanding of the pieces' musical complexities and expressive possibilities. This account of the Fifth, in particular, makes more coherent sense of this single-movement mosaic - essentially a suite of character pieces with connecting interludes - than any other performance I've heard. And the huge First Quartet, Carter's first masterpiece and one of the greatest of all 20th-century quartets, emerges with all its emotional power intact. A wonderful bargain, and the best possible introduction to Carter's music.