Columbia’s Early Juilliard Recordings – newly transferred and remastered for their first release on CD. The first ever release of the Juilliard String Quartet’s early Columbia recordings from 1949 to 1954 in a single 16-CD edition. 15 LPs appearing for the first time on CD, remastered from the original analogue masters using 24-bit / 192 kHz technology. Facsimile LP sleeves and labels, booklet with full discographical notes.

Following up its widely acclaimed reissues of the Juilliard Quartet’s complete Epic and RCA Victor albums – originally issued between 1956 and 1960 – Sony Classical is excited to present a new box set collecting the earliest albums of this august American ensemble. Made between 1949 and 1956 in Columbia’s studio on Manhattan’s 30th Street, these landmark recordings are mostly new to CD. The heart of this release comprising 16 newly-mastered CDs and also featuring works by Mozart, Ravel, Webern, Milhaud, Copland, Peter Mennin, Alexei Haieff and Andrew Imbrie, are three discs containing the premiere of Béla Bartók’s six quartets on records, which were set down in 1949. They appeared on LP and 78s the following year, bringing the Juilliard Quartet its first real celebrity. Recorded on 78rpm shellacs rather than on tape, this path-breaking set thus consists of live, unedited performances.