String Quartet No.5

Bartók’s Fifth Quartet is another example of the concentric five-movement pattern that had served him so well in the Fourth. In this case the centre piece is a scherzo, ingeniously designed to exploit Bulgarian additive rhythms, with a night-music slow movement on each side of it. The last movement reflects the first with a fugal passage based on a version of the its main theme and a climactic recall of the pounding rhythms from the beginning of the work. A crudely harmonised imitation of a barrel-organ makes an oddly ironic intrusion shortly before the uncompromisingly serious ending.shortly before the uncompromisingly serious ending.

Béla Bartók (1881-1945)

String Quartet No.5

Allegro

Adagio molto

Scherzo: alla bulgarese - Trio - Scherzo da capo

Andante

Finale: allegro vivace - presto

Stimulated by a generous commission from the American patron Elizabeth Sprague-Coolidge, Bartók completed his Fifth String Quartet in just four weeks, in August and September 1934. It was phenomenally quick work even if he didn’t have to spend very long on devising a structural plan for it. All Bartók had to do, in fact, was to to take the concentric five-movement pattern that had served him so well in the Fourth Quartet. In this case the centre piece is a scherzo with a slow movement on each side of it and, as in the Fourth Quartet, the first movement is reflected in the last.

The features of the opening Allegro that recur in the Finale are the pounding rhythms at the beginning and the theme that emerges from them, with a gradual widening of the melodic intervals, on the two violins. Another prominent feature, the liberated dance tune that bounds so colourfully into the central section, finds its reflection not so much in the last movement, however, as in the central Scherzo.

The Adagio molto, the first of the two related slow movements, mingles one of Bartók’s most poetic studies in night music with veiled but surely deliberate allusions to Beethoven’s Op.132 - not only in the first melodic entry on violin but also in the hushed chorale that follows. There’s another possible allusion to Op.132 in the melody shared by viola and cello in the bagpipes middle section of the Sherzo alla bulgarese, a movement ingeniously designed to exploit the Bulgarian rhythmic characteristic that divides the beats in each each bar into unequal groups. The Andante, a variant of the Adagio molto, retains something of the night-music atmosphere of the earlier movement but discards the Beethoven allusions. The proportions are different too: the nocturnal introduction, eerily coloured by pizzicato glissandi, is longer in this case and the chorale, now transformed into quietly shuddering chords on all four instruments, is shorter.

The Finale is a rondo so rigorously organised at first that its early episodes are based on variants of its own, relentlessly pressurised main theme. Eventually, however, it accommodates a fugal passage based on a version of the first theme of the opening Allegro and a climactic recall of the pounding rhythms from the beginning. But where an allusion to the uninhibited dance tune might be expected

The features of the opening Allegro that recur in the Finale are the pounding rhythms at the beginning and the theme that emerges from them, with a gradual widening of the melodic intervals, on the two violins. Another prominent feature, the liberated dance tune that bounds so colourfully into the central section, finds its reflection not so much in the last movement, however, as in the central Scherzo.

The Adagio molto, the first of the two related slow movements, mingles one of Bartók’s most poetic studies in night music with veiled but surely deliberate allusions to Beethoven’s Op.132 - not only in the first melodic entry on violin but also in the hushed chorale that follows. There’s another possible allusion to Op.132 in the melody shared by viola and cello in the bagpipes middle section of the Sherzo alla bulgarese, a movement ingeniously designed to exploit the Bulgarian rhythmic characteristic that divides the beats in each each bar into unequal groups. The Andante, a variant of the Adagio molto, retains something of the night-music atmosphere of the earlier movement but discards the Beethoven allusions. The proportions are different too: the nocturnal introduction, eerily coloured by pizzicato glissandi, is longer in this case and the chorale, now transformed into quietly shuddering chords on all four instruments, is shorter.

The Finale is a rondo so rigorously organised at first that its early episodes are based on variants of its own, relentlessly pressurised main theme. Eventually, however, it accommodates a fugal passage based on a version of the first theme of the opening Allegro and a climactic recall of the pounding rhythms from the beginning. But where an allusion to the uninhibited dance tune might be expected Bartok inserts a crudely harmonised imitation of a barrel-organ - an ironic gesture that precedes an uncompromisingly serious ending.

If there is any signficance in the apparent references in the Adagio molto of Bartók’s Fifth Quartet to the Molto adagio of Beethoven’s Quartet in A minor Op.132 it is that Bartók was grateful not only for a generous commission from his American patron, Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, but also for the restoration of creative energy that came with it. Certainly, the composition of the Fifth String Quartet in just over four weeks was phenomenally quick work, even if he didn’t have to spend very long on devising a structural plan for it. All he had to do, in fact, was take the concentric five-movement pattern which had served him so well in the Fourth String Quartet in 1928 and adapt it. In this case the centre piece is a scherzo, ingeniously designed to exploit irregular Bulgarian rhythms, with a night-music slow movement on each side of it. The last movement reflects the first with a fugal passage based on a version of the its main theme and a climactic recall of the pounding rhythms from the beginning of the work. A crudely harmonised imitation of a barrel-organ makes an oddly ironic intrusion shortly before the uncompromisingly serious ending.

Stimulated by a generous commission from the American patron Elizabeth Sprague-Coolidge, Bartók completed his Fifth String Quartet in just four weeks, in August and September 1934. It was phenomenally quick work even if he didn’t have to spend very long on devising a structural plan for it. All Bartók had to do, in fact, was to to take the concentric five-movement pattern that had served him so well in the Fourth Quartet. In this case the centre piece is a scherzo with a slow movement on each side of it and, as in the Fourth Quartet, the first movement is reflected in the last.

The features of the opening Allegro that recur in the Finale are the pounding rhythms at the beginning and the theme that emerges from them, with a gradual widening of the melodic intervals, on the two violins. Another prominent feature, the liberated dance tune that bounds so colourfully into the central section, finds its reflection not so much in the last movement, however, as in the central Scherzo.

The Adagio molto, the first of the two related slow movements, mingles one of Bartók’s most poetic studies in night music with veiled but surely deliberate allusions to Beethoven’s Op.132 - not only in the first melodic entry on violin but also in the hushed chorale that follows. There’s another possible allusion to Op.132 in the melody shared by viola and cello in the bagpipes middle section of the Sherzo alla bulgarese, a movement ingeniously designed to exploit the Bulgarian rhythmic characteristic that divides the beats in each each bar into unequal groups. The Andante, a variant of the Adagio molto, retains something of the night-music atmosphere of the earlier movement but discards the Beethoven allusions. The proportions are different too: the nocturnal introduction, eerily coloured by pizzicato glissandi, is longer in this case and the chorale, now transformed into quietly shuddering chords on all four instruments, is shorter.

The Finale is a rondo so rigorously organised at first that its early episodes are based on variants of its own, relentlessly pressurised main theme. Eventually, however, it accommodates a fugal passage based on a version of the first theme of the opening Allegro and a climactic recall of the pounding rhythms from the beginning. But where an allusion to the uninhibited dance tune might be expected Bartok inserts a crudely harmonised imitation of a barrel-organ - an ironic gesture that precedes an uncompromisingly serious ending.

Elizabeth Sprague-Coolidge’s commission for a string quartet, to be first performed at the Library of Congress in Washington, was well timed. Having written little more than arrangements in the three years since he had completed his Second Piano Concerto in 1931, Bartók needed some such stimulus to undertake another major work. Mrs Sprague-Coolidge might have been “completely deaf,” as Diaghilev ungenerously remarked to Stravinsky but, as Stravinsky realistically replied, she did have the advantage that “she pays.”

If there is any signficance in the apparent references in the Adagio molto of the new work to the Molto adagio of Beethoven’s Quartet in A minor, Op.132, it is that Bartók was grateful not only for the payment from the commission but also for the restoration of creative energy that came with it. Certainly, the composition of the Fifth String Quartet in just over four weeks, in August and September 1934, was phenomenally quick work - even if he didn’t have to spend very long on devising a structural plan for it. All he had to do, in fact, was take the concentric five-movement pattern which had served him so well in the Fourth String Quartet in 1928 and adapt it. In the earlier work the centre piece is a slow movement, with a scherzo on each side of it. In this case the centre piece is a scherzo with a slow movement on each side of it; as in the Fourth Quartet, an Allegro first movement is reflected in a matching finale. If the thematic organisation in the Fifth Quartet does not have the monothematic rigour of the Fourth it is because of an apparently more relaxed attitude to tunefulness for its own sake.

It is true that the percussive B flats at the opening of the first Allegro are neither relaxed nor tuneful. But, although the theme that grows from the repeated notes in ever widening intervals on the two violins is the more important feature, a hint of a dance tune below it on viola and cello suggests that a more tuneful element might develop. A transitional passage, including what amounts to a new theme bouncing up and down over wide intervals in vigorous syncopations, does not seem to encourage that notion. And the second subject, which follows an even more emphatic reiteration of the first, while it is gently coloured and sinuously phrased, is cramped into narrow, mainly semitonal intervals. But in the very middle of a tense development section there is a liberated passage where the dance jumps into the foreground, in fortissimo octaves first on the two violins and then on viola and cello, against the bouncing syncopations in the other parts. In the recapitulation, where the main themes are recalled in reverse order and in inversion, it reverts to its former modest status.

The Adagio molto, the first of the two related slow movements, mingles one of Bartók’s most poetic studies in night music with veiled but surely deliberate allusions to Beethoven’s Op.132. The first melodic entry, after the quietly trilled nocturnal whisperings, is an inverted version of the first four notes of the Quartet in A minor and, although the hushed chorale is a regular feature of Bartók’s night music, the one that now follows could, in this context, be taken as a parallel to Beethoven’s “hymn of thanksgiving from one who has recovered from an illness.” Later events are in the central development section, where even more atmospherically scored night-time colouring is allied with more specific melodic allusions to Beethoven’s Molto adagio, seem to confirm that impression. The chorale is briefly recapitulated and the nocturnal introduction is reflected in a muted closing section that finally slides into silence.

The Scherzo alla bulgarese exploits an aspect of East-European folk song of particular interest to Bartók, the so-called “Bulgarian rhythm” that divides the beats in each bar into unequal groups.Here is more of the tuneful element promised at the beginning of the work - if not in the first theme, neatly synthesised out of minor and major thirds and introduced over the cello’s pizzicato definition of the uneven metre, then certainly in the second theme, a dance tune that makes its entry on first violin with a refreshing lack of inhibition. The central Trio section, in a different Bulgarian metre, proves no less attractive as the tempo accelerates to greet a melody to be shared by viola and cello throughout (and, perhaps, to echo the bagpipes episode in the equivalent movement of Beethoven’s Op.132). The Scherzo da capo is no literal repeat of the first part, least of all when it takes to syncopating the Bulgarian rhythms and contradicting the bar lines in a canonic treatment of the dance tune.

The Andante, a variant of the Adagio molto, retains something of the night-music atmosphere of the earlier movement but discards the Beethoven allusions. The proportions are different too: the nocturnal introduction, eerily coloured by pizzicato glissandi, is longer in this case and the chorale, now transformed into quietly shuddering chords on all four instruments, is shorter. The central section develops material which seemed to have little significance in the Adagio molto but which here, after a dramatic recall of the shuddering chorale, is carried to a sustained climax on the two violins over a buzz of chromatic activity on viola and cello. The closing section restores the chorale to something closer to its original form on the two violins, reduces it to a spectral rattle of wood on strings and abandons it to a series of rising pizzicato-glissando chords on the cello.

The Finale is a rondo so rigorously organised at first that its early episodes are based on variants of the relentlessly pressurised rondo theme. Eventually, however, it accommodates a fugal passage based on a version of the first theme of the first movement and even a capricious scherzando episode. So, after the tempo slows for a climactic recall of the repeated notes from the beginning of the first movement, it must be time for the tuneful element to reassert itself. Bartok’s answer to that mistaken expectation is an ironic, crudely harmonised barrel-organ imitation which, as it winds down in tempo and slips out of tune, is impatiently swept away by an uncompromisingly serious, ever faster coda.