If the notion of Joseph Haydn as the “Father of the Symphony” needs serious qualification, his status as the father of the string quartet remains unchallenged, and the early history of the string quartet is in many ways the history of Haydn’s journey with the genre. Well-known string quartets can be found in the list of string quartet ensembles. Some quartets play together for many years in ensembles which may be named after the first violinist (e.g. The standard structure for a string quartet is four movements, with the 1st movement in Sonata form, Allegro, in the tonic key 2nd movement is a slow movement, in thesubdominant key 3rd movement is a Minuet and Trio, in the tonic key and the 4th movement is often in Rondo form or Sonata rondo form, in the tonic key. In the 21st century it remains an important and refined musical form. A slight slackening in the pace of quartet composition occurred in the later 19th century, in part due to a movement away from classical forms by composers such as Liszt, Wagner and Richard Strauss, though it received a resurgence in the 20th with the Second Viennese School, Bartók, Shostakovich and Elliot Carter producing highly regarded examples of the genre. Quartet composition flourished in the Classical era, with Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert following Haydn in each writing a number of quartets. Thus, in many ways the string quartet is pre-eminently the dialectical form of instrumental music, the one most naturally suited to the activity of logical disputation and philosophical enquiry. Thus, where the composer of symphonies commands the means for textural enrichment beyond the call of his harmonic discourse, and where the concerto medium offers the further resource of personal characterization and drama in the individual-pitted-against-the-mass vein, the writer of string quartets must perforce concentrate on the bare bones of musical logic. The closely related characters of the four instruments, moreover, while they cover in combination an ample compass of pitch, do not lend themselves to indulgence in purely colouristic effects. With four parts to play with, a composer working in anything like the classical key system has enough lines to fashion a full argument, but none to spare for padding. Ever since Haydn’s day the string quartet has been considered a prestigious form and represents one of the true tests of the composer’s art. The string quartet was developed into its current form by the Austrian composer Joseph Haydn, with his works in the 1750s establishing the genre. The string quartet is one of the most prominent chamber ensembles in classical music, with most major composers, from the mid to late 18th century onwards, writing string quartets. From left to right-violin 1, violin 2, viola, celloĪ string quartet is a musical ensemble of four string players-two violin players, a viola player and a cellist-or a piece written to be performed by such a group. See more Your browser does not support the audio element. This is an exceptional recording of chamber music. Finally, Onyx's engineering work in England's Potton Hall, Suffolk, is vivid and sharp. For the Ehnes Quartet, the quartet is something like a Scandinavian expressionist drama, with a flow of darkly submerged inner emotions. 63, even though it clearly shares that work's creative genesis. Then there is the five-movement Sibelius quartet, his only work in the form and a difficult piece to come to terms with: it does not fit into the epic vision of the composer's symphonies, nor into the transparent language of his theater music, nor even into the gloom of the contemporaneous Symphony No. Sample the first movement for a taste the four movements are all well thought out. Second is the extremely sharp recording of the much-recorded Schubert, which tends toward the hyper-emotional end of the spectrum but cages the emotions into hard-edged, slashing counterpoint. 56 ("Voces Intimae"), which have rarely if ever been put together but have everything to do with each other, beginning with the threat of death faced by each composer at the time. 810 ("Death and the Maiden") and Sibelius' String Quartet, Op. First there is the unusual pairing of the two D minor quartets, Schubert's String Quartet No. The strengths of this recording by the Ehnes Quartet, led by the remarkable Canadian violinist James Ehnes, are manifold. Purchase and download this album in a wide variety of formats depending on your needs.
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