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Antonín Dvořák's String Quintet No. 2 in
G major G major is a major scale based on G (musical note), G, with the pitches G, A (musical note), A, B (musical note), B, C (musical note), C, D (musical note), D, E (musical note), E, and F♯ (musical note), F. Its key signature has one sharp (music ...
, Op. 77 ( B. 49), was originally composed in early March 1875 and first performed on 18 March 1876 in
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at the concert of the '' Umělecká beseda''. It is scored for two
violin The violin, sometimes referred to as a fiddle, is a wooden chordophone, and is the smallest, and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in regular use in the violin family. Smaller violin-type instruments exist, including the violino picc ...
s,
viola The viola ( , () ) is a string instrument of the violin family, and is usually bowed when played. Violas are slightly larger than violins, and have a lower and deeper sound. Since the 18th century, it has been the middle or alto voice of the ...
,
cello The violoncello ( , ), commonly abbreviated as cello ( ), is a middle pitched bowed (sometimes pizzicato, plucked and occasionally col legno, hit) string instrument of the violin family. Its four strings are usually intonation (music), tuned i ...
, and
double bass The double bass (), also known as the upright bass, the acoustic bass, the bull fiddle, or simply the bass, is the largest and lowest-pitched string instrument, chordophone in the modern orchestra, symphony orchestra (excluding rare additions ...
. First marked as Op. 18, it was later slightly revised in 1888 as Op. 77. It has since been assigned the Burghauser number B. 49. Dvořák entered the piece in a competition and was awarded 5
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s for the composition. The work bears the competition's motto, "To my Nation", as its dedication. Although the original work was scored in five movements, Dvořák later withdrew the second movement, entitled "Intermezzo," due to concerns that having two slow movements made the work too lengthy. This extracted movement had been based on the central section, marked 'Andante religioso', of his String Quartet No. 4 (which was not published in his lifetime), and was in turn later reworked and republished as the Nocturne for Strings in B major, Op. 40 (B. 47). Some modern ensembles choose to restore the intermezzo when performing the work. The work was published in 1888 by Simrock, not under its original opus number 18, but as Opus 77.


Structure

The quintet consists of four movements:


Selected recordings

*''String Quintet No. 2, String Sextet''. CD Supraphon (11 1461-2 131). *''The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center: Dvorak Serenade.'' Perf. Joseph Silverstein, Ani Kavafian, Paul Neubauer, Gary Hoffman, Edgar Meyer. CD. Delos, 1995.


References

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External links

*
String Quintet No. 2 on a comprehensive Dvorak sitePerformance of String Quintet No. 2
by The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in MP3 format String quintets by Antonín Dvořák 1875 compositions Compositions in G major {{chamber-composition-stub