Top 10 Favorite Quintets

[Symphonic Addict]

Listing some favorite piano quintets for now. Huber's staggering Piano Quintet No. 2 made me do it.

I had to include 11, not 10:

Huber No. 2
Toch (another striking recent rediscovery that made me include it here)
Taneyev
Elgar
Cras
Schumann
Castillon
Koechlin
Schmitt
Fauré No. 2
Korngold

Interesting to notice how many brilliant exemplars the French left us.

[kyjo]

Listing some favorite piano quintets for now. Huber's staggering Piano Quintet No. 2 made me do it.

I had to include 11, not 10:

Huber No. 2
Toch (another striking recent rediscovery that made me include it here)
Taneyev
Elgar
Cras
Schumann
Castillon
Koechlin
Schmitt
Fauré No. 2
Korngold

Interesting to notice how many brilliant exemplars the French left us.

Great to hear that you became acquainted with Huber's Piano Quintet No. 2 - a strikingly colorful and individual score, and definitely more compelling than the majority of his symphonies. Huber has as a reputation as quite a "conservative" composer, so I was pleasantly surprised by the au courant, quasi-impressionistic approach to texture and color that Huber employs in this work. His more "Brahmsian" Piano Quintet No. 1 isn't quite on the same level, but is still a fine work in its own right.

Now, for my updated list of favorite piano quintets:

Bloch No. 1
Cras
Dvořák No. 2
Elgar
Hahn
Huré
Schumann
Taneyev
Vaughan Williams
Weinberg

Agreed that the French school produced many wonderful works in this form/instrumentation - I added the Hahn and Huré quintets to the mix, and also worthy of mention are those by Théodore Dubois (w/oboe instead of a 2nd violin), Frank Martin (an early work, very Ravelian in style), Saint-Saëns, and Vierne.

[kyjo]

Now, for my top 10 quintets other than piano quintets:

Bax: Quintet for Harp and Strings
Bliss: Oboe Quintet (or the Clarinet Quintet)
Brahms: String Quintet No. 2 in G major
Cras: Quintette for flute, harp, and string trio
Dvořák: String Quintet No. 3 in E-flat major "American"
Fibich: Quintet in D major for clarinet, horn, violin, cello, and piano
Glazunov: String Quintet in A major
Mendelssohn: String Quintet No. 2 in B-flat major
Mozart: String Quintet No. 4 in G minor
Schubert: String Quintet in C major

[Madiel]

I can see myself going on another quintet listening run soon... although the chance of anything toppling Faure no.1 in the piano field is minimal.

I have a couple of string quintets coming so maybe I'll put those together. Off the top of my head I'll have at least Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Brahms and Dvorak.

[JBS]

Since I am now listening to the Pentatone Spohr set, I feel justified in saying his string quintets (he wrote seven) are not to sneezed at.