Classical Music | Music for Quartet

Recorded on 02/04/2015, uploaded on 06/25/2015

Musician's or Publisher's Notes

Franz Schubert began his Twelfth String Quartet in December 1820. The first movement and forty measures of an Andante second movement were completed before he abandoned the work. The completed first movement has since come to be known as the Quartett-Satz. Despite being abandoned, the Quartett-Satz is considered to be an important work in Schubert’s oeuvre and the precursor of his later, most successful, quartets. Four years later, in 1824, Schubert returned to the genre and composed the Rosamunde, Death and the Maiden and Fifteenth Quartets.

The Quartett-Satz opens with a two-fold idea that forms the melodic germ of the piece—first, an oscillating semitone motif, which is then repeated descending along the melodic minor scale to form the second motif. The first thematic section passes briefly by and transitions nearly without notice into the second theme. A lyrical tune in A-flat major, the second theme is accompanied by the triplet rhythm of the first theme. At the conclusion of the second theme, the driving tremolos that begun the work make a startling return in the remote key of A-flat minor and through a series of sweeping violin runs manages its way back to the key of G. Forming the closing section of the exposition, the first theme returns with a new countermelody set against it.

The development section is brief and focuses entirely upon the motif of the first theme. Set against this incessant melodic idea, a new idea is heard first in the violin and then passed back and forth between it and the cello. The recapitulation, for the most part, follows the plan of the exposition with the sole exception of the omission of the first theme. While by no means exceptional, in this instance the artistic reasons for Schubert’s omission of the first theme are quite easily deduced. A return of the opening bars of the movement serves as a brief coda before full-voiced chords bring the piece to a dramatic close.      Joseph DuBose

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Quartettsatz in C minor, D. 703     Franz Schubert

Having not written a string quartet in over three years, Schubert composed this single-movement work in c-minor, now called Quartettsatz, in 1820, with the intention of writing a complete four-movement quartet. Speculation runs rampant among musicologists as to why the composer never completed the work, yet it remains entirely possible that he was simply distracted by other more pressing projects. Regardless of the circumstances by which Schubert ceased work on his twelfth string quartet, this sonata-form movement is considered one of the first examples of the composer’s later style, tapping into the tempestuous and romantic qualities of his maturing musical aesthetic. The movement opens in a whirlwind of notes that might call to mind the frigid scenes of Winterreise. Quickly, though, we take refuge in the elegant lyricism of the second theme, which serves as a pleasant respite from the bitter cold. Schubert ends the piece exactly as he began, heading boldly into the storm.     Tesla Quartet

Courtesy of International Music Foundation.