String Quartet in F major Op 18 No 1 (1798-1800)

In June 1799 Beethoven proudly sent his violinist friend Karl Amenda a set of parts for a recently completed Quartet in F major. Two years later he wrote to him again: “Be sure not to pass on your quartet to anyone else, since I have substantially altered it. For only now have I learnt to write quartets properly.” During the course of his work on his first set of string quartets, which he had started with what is now known as Op.18 No.3 in the summer of 1798 and had continued with the present Quartet in F, he had developed his technique to such an extent, it seems, that he was embarrassed by his initial efforts.

Even more remarkable than the accomplishment of the revised version of the quartet he chose to head his Op.18 set is its leap ahead into the new century. In its compact shape and the use to which it is put, the opening phrase clearly anticipates that of the Quartetto serioso Op.95, which he was to write a decade later. True, being in a major key, it is not as aggressive as its counterpart in the Quartet in F minor, but its grip on the structure of the first movement – where it is repeated literally dozens of times – is no less firm.

Taking a still bigger leap, covering four decades in this case, the Adagio must be the most romantically expressive reaction to a Shakespearian tragedy before Berlioz’s Roméo et Juliette. In fact, it was inspired by the tomb scene in the same play – as we know not only from a contemporary witness but also from Beethoven’s own sketches. If we didn’t know we would probably guess from such features as the long-breathed melodic line of the main theme drawn over throbbing minor harmonies, the major-key pathos of the second subject, the eloquent silences, the shuddering demisemiquaver figure first heard on violin in the development section and growing in intensity up to the dramatic diminished seventh near the end.

The romantic inspiration of the slow movement is all the more striking for its context, alongside the business-like first movement, the witty Scherzo, and the brilliant sonata-rondo finale – all of them thorougly modern in their time and impeccably Viennese-classical in style.