MUNDOCLASICO.COM, 20.5.2008 --- Their performance was in all respects simply sensational. Outstanding technique, transcendental expression, perfect interplay, sonority, spine-tingling stuff. This programme couldnot be performed better. (...) Antje Weithaas (...) plunges into the music, she interprets with heart and soul. From inside outwards, she performs everything the music requires and impresses every listener, without them having to know the music. Thanks to his sensitivity and adaptability, Daniel Sepec is an ideal second violinist. Tabea Zimmermann is one of the best viola players in the world and her leading parts sounded splendidly beautiful. Jean-Guihen Queyras, a multi-faceted cellist and viola da gamba player, provides the quartet with a steady and sensitive foundation. (...) A long stillness topped the performance off. That was followed by bravos and everlasting applause until the quartet took its leave of the standing audience, which was still touched with what they had just experienced. A noteworthy concert, which will not be easily forgotton.
LUXEMBURG WORT, 25/2/2008 --- Here it became clear how extraordinary the members of the ensemble are. The cellist Jean-Guihen Queyras provided the foundation for both violins and the viola with tremendously clear, discreet and steady movement, mediating between their melodic phrases. (...) The elaborate principal theme, reminiscent of Mahler, is performed by Antje Weithaas (first violin) with rich, at climaxes even with powerful intonation in exposition and recapitulation, in-between enchantingly gentle by Tabea Zimmermann's viola, gruff and fragile by the cello, the accurate pizzicati by Daniel Sepec (second violin) and the other accompanying parts contributing significantly to it.
TELEGRAPH, 13/11/2008 --- The Arcanto Quartet is one of the most stimulating, enjoyable ensembles to listen to, no matter what it is playing. Freshness, close rapport, finesse and a blend of eloquence and vitality have been hallmarks of its style ever since its debut four years ago. The experience of the Arcanto's members in other musical fields brings individuality to the strands of the quartet texture, which at the same time coalesce and show mature understanding in matters of interpretation. So it was in this recital of four Haydn string quartets. In terms of characterisation, one could look to the Arcanto's relishing of the harmonic scrunches in the first movement of the B minor Op 64 No 2 or the sophisticated burlesque of its finale, the grandeur of Op 74 No 1, the playful bouncing of octaves in the D major Op 71 No 2 or the gently bucolic drone that underpinned the andante of the E flat Op 50 No 3. And the Arcanto sees the wit in Haydn's trick endings, those traps that the composer laid for the unwary among his audience and which here were neither over- nor understated but done with just the right hint of a smile. Such details were incorporated into performances of poise, animation and joy that hit the spot and simply made one glad to be there.
GRAMOPHONE, August 2007 --- For one, the playing is superb, the biting attack of the Fifth Quartet's opening, its precision, energy and tempered rhythmic momentum, not to mention the accuracy of intonation throughout. Everything tells, nothing sounds rushed. (...) No doubt about it, this is one of the most impressive, the most human accounts of Bartok Five I've heard in a long while (...). What's for sure is that any internal disharmony would have surfaced in Bartok's fragile last quartet, another memorable performance. Again, everything is well articulated (...). It's another winner, purposeful yet refined, and a worthy conclusion to what I hope will eventually emerge as a complete cycle. OK, I know we're particularly well off for Bartok quartets on CD, but not so well off that interpretation of this calibre isn't also welcome.
THE TIMES, 8/6/2007 --- Bartók's Fifth and Sixth String Quartets receive superb handling in the Arcanto Quartet's recording debut. (...) Their precision is Godlike, while their full-blooded spirit allows a delicate response to tone and phrasing. They're equally impressive driving an argument at white heat (the Fifth's first movement).
WESTDEUTSCHE ALLGEMEINE ZEITUNG, 3/5/2007 --- The quartet cultivates an exquisitely sophisticated, diverse sound. Their repeated dynamic retreats into the subtlest pianissimo lent Schubert's String Quartet in E flat major (D87) a weightlessness which is seldom heard. But that's not all they can do. Wherever needed, the four of them surprise the audience with expressive eruptions of sound, as they often demonstrated in Bartók's explosive String Quartet No. 5. (...) One thing is for sure: anyone who can interpret chamber music this excitingly can confidently rank themselves as one of the greatest string quartets.
BADISCHE ZEITUNG, 4/5/2007 --- It blows you away: by this enormous range of expressions, such as in Haydn's Adagio, the exemplary unison piano, without overdoing delicacy, and the exquisite transparency in the playing of these four musicians. This creates an experience, too, from a young work such as Schubert's E flat major quartet, written when the composer was 16. In a chamber music festival packed with highlights, perhaps the most moving moment was offered by the Arcanto Quartet and Jörg Widmann (...). Any attempt to put this into words would fail miserably; suffice to say that the maturity of Brahms' late style found its counterpart in this haunting interpretation.
THE HERALD, 19/8/2006 --- For any group to open a concert with Mozart's Dissonance Quartet represents something of a challenge (...). The sophistication with which the Arcanto Quartet peeled back the layers of the music almost beggared belief. The refinement of musicianship between the players, and that indefinable sense of four musicians having seemlessly blended themselves into an indivisible unit, characterised a revealing interpretation of the music, whose complexity dissolved in the face of such unified intimacy. The soft setting-down of the end of the first movement with a series of immaculately-placed chords was one of those miraculous moments of performance that live with you. If anything, the mesmerising interpretations of Ravel's String Quartet and Beethoven's opus 59 F major Quartet were even more impressive, with supple fluidity and an exceptional rapport between the players.
THE SCOTSMAN 19/8/2006 --- The Ravel quivered incessantly with exciting touches, the slow movement enriched with a mesmerising, ethereal quality as the players teased out its silken textures. The Beethoven was no less inspirational. It had backbone: the grizzly dissonances of the opening Allegro were carved out like rough-hewn rocks, the more exposed intimacy of the Allegretto was delivered with sensitised virtuosity.
DE MORGEN, 13/2/2006 --- The Arcanto Quartet's concerts are still rare. For the listener, they are downright confrontations: with Über-musicianship, with an ideal balance between independence and unity, with perfection or the best attempt at perfection. This won't last much longer, but it is still possible to hear the Arcanto in small chamber music halls. Last year in the Brussels Conservatory, last week Friday in the Handelsbeurs in Gent. (...) It would make for a very long list if one wanted to include all the admirable qualities of this Quartet. Briefly and succinctly, the important message is this: Make sure that you are at their next concert.
MAIN-ECHO, 24.25/9/2005 --- Brahms's Piano Quintet as well as Schumann's Piano Quartet were enhanced to an almost orchestral sound - with fantastic results. There were twinkles and sparks in every note, at the same time fervid animation, and such an irrepressible joy at the variety in sound in this music that all listeners couldn't but be raptured and amazed.
SÜDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG, 5/7/2005 --- One almost can't want the contouring of contrasts in Beethoven's first Rasumovsky quartet to be any more impressive, gruffer and sharper. And it got even better. With their structurally masterful interpretation of Bartok's fifth string quartet that got under one's skin, Antje Weithaas, Daniel Sepec, Tabea Zimmermann and Jean-Guihen Queyras showed their enormous potential.
