The Léner Quartet was the first ensemble to record all of Beethoven’s 16 string quartets. Hailing from Budapest, Hungary, three of the members had been pupils of the famed Jenő Hubay; the Léner Quartet was perhaps the preeminent string quartet of the 1920s. After their successful UK debut in 1922, British Columbia signed the quartet. Besides the Beethoven cycle, they recorded much Haydn and Mozart, as well as the complete Brahms quartets.

The two late Beethoven quartets included on this CD are the acoustical version made in 1924. Although they were supplanted in the catalogue by electrically recorded versions made a decade later, most connoisseurs of chamber music regard these earlier recordings as superior. Furthermore, their rendition of Beethoven’s A minor Quartet has an important literary reference, where it becomes a central image in the final chapter of Aldous Huxley’s 1928 novel Point Counter Point. The moving description of the Heilige Dankgesang and its effect on the main character Spandrell in the last minutes of his life is a tribute to the intensity of the performance.