The Belgian-French composer Désiré Paque (1867-1939) is hardly a household name. That is partly due to his reclusivity; he wrote much music and wrote a long series of articles on his (pretty revolutionary) musical ideas but his lack of interaction with the musical scene contributed to his lack of recognition. It must have, for Paque is a truly original and excellent composer (that assessment is based on the music on this disc and the assessment in the Grove). Paque advanced principles of atonality predating Schönberg and rejected traditional development (instead basing the music on unaltered main themes and attaching new motifs to these) and regular time signature. But little of his material was published, and it was known by few people before the thirties. Anyway, if these pieces of information makes you suspect something abrasive and harsh-sounding from this disc, you are wrong. These are wistfully melodic works displaying real imagination and inventiveness and compositional skill - yes, there are some strikingly unusual ideas contained in them, especially pertaining to development, but anyone enjoying, say, Verklährte Nacht, Schönberg's first quartet or perhaps Berg's piano sonata should find much to relish in this music.The second quartet from 1894 is an early work, but still displays a strikingly original mind. The first movement is built around a beautiful main theme (with three subsidiary themes), but the whole work is generally lyrical and warm, inventive and masterfully written for strings. The fifth quartet dates from 1902, and is slightly more twentieth century in sound (although Paque seems to have retained romantic sensibilities throughout his life, despite his original compositional techniques). It is more somber and nervous than the second, but still expertly written and full of interesting ideas. The seventh quartet, from 1921 is more densely polyphonic, but in a manner that pays close attention to form - that is, to establishing a structured discourse and formal cohesion between the various ideas - there is little that is conventional about the development. But the work is also warmly lyrical and melodic, in a way somewhat reminiscent of Richard Strauss.I had never encountered the Quauor à cordes du Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie before (I think), but they provide committed and generally beautiful performances here, which seem to display a thorough understanding of the music. The tone is warm and the textures nuanced and colorful. Sound quality is splendid as well. In short, this is really something of a find and is enthusiastically recommended to anyone adventurous or with an ear for strikingly original yet wonderful music unjustifiably overlooked. And Paque composed a rather large number of works - it would be really interesting if anyone could explore a couple of his orchestral works.