The String Quartet No. 2 in

A minor A minor is a minor scale based on A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. Its key signature has no flats or sharps. Its relative major is C major and its parallel major is A major. The A natural minor scale is: Changes needed for the melodic ...

Béla Bartók Béla Viktor János Bartók (; ; 25 March 1881 – 26 September 1945) was a Hungarian composer, pianist and ethnomusicologist. He is considered one of the most important composers of the 20th century; he and Franz Liszt are regarded as Hunga ...

was written between 1915 and October 1917 in

Rákoskeresztúr Rákoskeresztúr () is a former town in Hungary now part of District XVII of Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European U ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

. It is one of six

string quartets The term string quartet refers to either a type of musical composition or a group of four people who play them. Many composers from the mid-18th century onwards wrote string quartets. The associated musical ensemble consists of two violinists, a ...

by Bartok. The work is in three movements: In a letter to André Gertier, Bartók described the first movement as being in

sonata form The sonata form (also sonata-allegro form or first movement form) is a musical form, musical structure generally consisting of three main sections: an exposition, a development, and a recapitulation. It has been used widely since the middle of t ...

, the second as "a kind of

rondo The rondo or rondeau is a musical form that contains a principal theme (music), theme (sometimes called the "refrain") which alternates with one or more contrasting themes (generally called "episodes", but also referred to as "digressions" or "c ...

" and the third as "difficult to define" but possibly a sort of

ternary form Ternary form, sometimes called song form, is a three-part musical form consisting of an opening section (A), a following section (B) and then a repetition of the first section (A). It is usually schematized as A–B–A. Prominent examples inclu ...

Zoltán Kodály Zoltán Kodály (, ; , ; 16 December 1882 – 6 March 1967) was a Hungarian composer, ethnomusicologist, music pedagogue, linguist, and philosopher. He is well known internationally as the creator of the Kodály method of music education. ...

, who thought of the three movements of this quartet as "life episodes," heard "peaceful life" in the first movement, and for all its roiling emotions, the movement does indeed leave an impression of tranquility at the end. The brooding, intense last movement (Kodály heard it as "suffering") is particularly funereal because it is as immobile as the second movement is animated. Long stretches are rhythmically static, and the parts that do move are often interrupted by silence.String Quartet No. 2 / Béla Bartók
LA Philharmonic program notes by Howard Posner The work was dedicated to the , who gave the piece its premiere on 3 March 1918 in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

. The work was first published in 1920 by

Universal Edition Universal Edition (UE) is an Austrian classical music publishing firm. Founded in 1901 in Vienna, it originally intended to provide the core classical works and educational works to the Austrian market. The firm soon expanded to become one of t ...

Discography

References

Bartók Quartet No. 2
lecture by

Roger Parker Roger Parker (born London United Kingdom, 2 August 1951) is an English musicologist who was previously Thurston Dart Professor of Music at King's College London. His work has centred on opera. Between 2006 and 2010, while Professor of Music at ...

, followed by a performance by the Badke Quartet,

Gresham College Gresham College is an institution of higher learning located at Barnard's Inn Hall off Holborn in Central London, England that does not accept students or award degrees. It was founded in 1597 under the Will (law), will of Sir Thomas Gresham, ...

, 4 December 2007 (available for download as MP3 or MP4, as well as a text document)

External links

*
Performance
by the

Borromeo String Quartet The Borromeo String Quartet is an American string quartet, in residence at the New England Conservatory since 1992. They have performed throughout North and South America, Europe, and Asia, at numerous festivals and in many distinguished chamber m ...

from the

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format 2 1917 compositions {{chamber-composition-stub