String Quartet in D major, Op.20, No.4 (Hob.III.34) (1772)

Once celebrated as the “Sun” Quartets – primarily but not only because of the illustration on the frontispiece of the edition published by Hummel in Berlin in 1779 – Haydn’s Op.20 is now seriously overshadowed by later sets from Op.33 and, particularly, Op.54 onwards. It is not, however, eclipsed by them. Having established the basics of the modern string quartet form and texture as early as 1770 in his Op.9 set – as the composer himself was to acknowledge towards the end of his life – and having in the meantime added the Op.17 set, by 1772 all the components of the mature Haydn string quartet were in place.

Perhaps the most striking quality of the first movement of the Quartet in D major is its economy. The rhythm of the first four notes of the main theme – four Ds heard on all four instrument in unison in the opening bars – echoes throughout the construction. In spite of vigorous efforts on first violin and cello to break free of it, the four-note rhythm keeps returning and, indeed, is so persistent in its quiet way as to leave no opportunity for the introduction of a distinctive second-subject theme before the end of the exposition. The development begins with it and, although the second violin now joins the first violin and cello in their efforts to escape in flights of triplets, the development ends with that rhythm too. It is perhaps unnecessary to add that the last four notes of the movement are four repeated Ds.

The slow movement is a theme and variations as resourcefully scored as many later examples of the form in Haydn’s string quartets. The first violin introduces the theme in D minor but then retires into the background for the second violin and viola to engage in an elegantly phrased dialogue in the first variation and for the cello to elaborate an eloquent line in the second. The first violin returns to the foreground to present the theme in an even figuration of triplet semiquavers in the third and in it original form in the fourth variation – not, however, to end the movement that way but to extend it in a surprisingly emotional and even dramatic development.

Anything but a minuet, the Menuetto is an early example of Haydn’s interest in Hungarian gypsy music, its bold cross rhythms and syncopations effectively offset by an aristocratic cello solo in the Trio section. There is more of the gypsy idiom in the Presto scherzando finale, which is so cheerfully spontaneous in its choice of material, one bright idea setting off another in a different direction, that the exotic colouring in the closing theme of the exposition seems not at all out of place. With its racy staccato figuration on first violin, it ostinato rhythm of quavers on the cello and its shrill offbeat chords on second violin and viola, it also secures a brilliant ending.