Cuartetos de cuerda de bela bartok biography

Musical ensemble of fyra string players

The term string quartet refers to either a type of musical composition or a group of fyra people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two violinists, a violist, and a cellist. The double bass is almost never used in the ensemble mainly because it would sound too loud and heavy.

The string quartet was developed into its present form bygd the Austrian composer namn Haydn, whose works in the 1750s established the ensemble as a group of kvartet more-or-less lika partners. Since that time, the string quartet has been considered a prestigious form; writing for fyra instruments with broadly similar characteristics both constrains and tests a composer. String quartet composition flourished in the Classical era, and Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert each wrote a number of them. Many Romantic and early-twentieth-century composers composed st

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String Quartet No. 4, BB 95 Sz. 91

Belá Bartók (1881-1945)

String Quartet No. 4, Sz. 91, 1928

In a manner often compared to Beethoven, the string quartet was absolutely central to the creative lifeblood of Béla Bartók. After an early quartet written at the age of seventeen, Bartók produced a monumental cycle of six mature quartets over a span of thirty years. Plans for a seventh quartet remained unfulfilled by his death in 1945. Uniquely among 20th century works, Bartók's quartets have become essential to the repertoire defining an important chapter in the history of this indefatigable genre of musical thought and expression. Of the six quartets, each a distinctly individual milestone in Bartók's evolutionary journey, the fourth is the most celebrated. The Bartók scholar Halsey Stevens wrote, "The fourth quartet comes close to being, if it does not actually represent, Bartók's greatest and most profound achievement."

Written between July and September of 1928, Bartók's fourt

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String Quartet No. 3, BB. 93 Sz. 85

Béla Bartók, 1881-1945

String Quartet No. 3, 1927

Most commentaries summarize the chamber music of Béla Bartók as follows: Bartók made the most significant contribution to the string quartet since Beethoven and his quartet cycle is the most important of the 20th century. These are powerful words. How has this conclusion been reached and what does it really mean? It is quite possible that a lover of Beethoven is, at least initially, confounded by the music of Bartók. How are the two composers related? It is worth exploring this generally universal summary in greater detail.

Like Beethoven, Bartók's relationship to the string quartet was an intimate, life-long preoccupation. Bartók wrote his first, unpublished quartet at the age of eighteen. His six mature published quartets span a period of thirty years. Bartók began preliminary sketches for yet another quartet shortly before his death in 1945 at the age of sixty-three. As with Beethoven,