Giuseppe Verdi (1813-1901)
String Quartet in E minor

Verdi composed the quartet in Naples, in three weeks of March 1873, during time off from rehearsals for Aida. The composer’s friends heard it performed by musicians of San Carlo theatre on April 1st. It was presented to the general public in Milan only in 1876.
String Quartet in E minor is Verdi’s single purely instrumental work; those he had written in his early used he destroyed. Above it hover the melodics of Aida and the rhetoric of operatic musical gestures. Despite some academic and somewhat conventional features, it shows a mastery of the genre. All movements are linked by motives and partly shaped according to strict polyphonic principles. The composer’s own opinion was ironic: “I don’t know if it’s a good or a bad quartet. I know it’s a quartet.”
∙ Movement One (Allegro) begins with a singing theme, its ardent emotionality echoing motives from Aida. The second, contemplative theme is also conducted in a vocal way. Its polyphonic accompaniment brings to mind operatic ensembles. The entries of the themes are separated by a contrapuntal episode. The classical sonata form has been treated with some imagination: there is no development here; development technique only appears in the exposition and in the recapitulation.
∙ Movement Two (Andantino) is akin in structure to a sonata rondo. The main theme develops in the rhythm of a stylised waltz. It is dominated by a melancholy tone, yet insistent accents appear, too. The contrasting episodes are revisited by motives of the second theme and the episode from Movement One.
∙ Movement Three (Prestissimo) is a dazzling scherzo, with audible rhythms of an Italian tarantella. In the middle trio, the cello sings a cheerful and quasi-folk canzona over a mandolin-imitating accompaniment.
∙ The final movement (Scherzo fuga. Allegro Assai mosso) is an elaborate fugue. Its ethereal character is evoked by a theme played staccato in piano dynamics. The fluent course of music leads to several short climaxes forte that arrest the motion. In the coda, the theme acquires features of vocal singing. The work ends with a daring climax in an accelerated tempo (Poco piú presto).

Ewa Siemdaj