Polish conductor and pianist Krystian Zimerman is joined by violinist Maria Nowak (co-leader of his Polish Festival Orchestra), violist Katarzyna Budnik (principal viola of the Sinfonia Varsovia), and cellist Yuya Okamoto (newly appointed cellist of the Ébène Quartet) to perform two piano quartets by Johannes Brahms.

In an interview with Presto Music, Zimerman is disarmingly honest about the foursome having come together “more or less by coincidence” through serendipitous encounters at concerts and competitions. Of the chosen repertoire for the album he says, “all Brahms’s chamber music is fantastic – the sonatas, the trios, the Clarinet Quintet. There is no bad piece among them.” Although Brahms’s Piano Quartet No. 1 in G minor is the best known of his three piano quartets, Zimerman focuses on the sometimes-overlooked Piano Quartets No. 2 and No. 3. He adds, “I particularly love the Third Quartet. It’s crazy. It’s so powerful. It has unbelievable drive.”