Wind Quintet Op.2 (1959)

Lento

Agitato

Vivo

Molto sostenutu

Rubato, improvisando

Grave, ma con slancio

Mesto –

Rubato, molto agitato

Early Kurtág though it is, the Wind Quintet is by no means as early as its opus number suggests. Behind the numbered works there is a pre-history of music – including a Viola Concerto much influenced by Bartók – which he wrote when he still subscribed to the artistic principles of the Communist regime in Hungary. One thing that changed his mind was the ruthless suppression of the uprising in 1956 – although, unlike his friend and colleague György Ligeti, he chose to stay in Hungary. Another formative experience, a year later, was a period of study in Paris where he attended the classes of Messiaen, Milhaud and Max Deutsch. He surely learned more, however, from the art psychologist Marianne Stein, whose advice that he should build his works round small units coincided decisively with his discovery of Webern at the concerts of the Domaine Musical and elsewhere. While neither the String Quartet Op.1 nor the Wind Quintet Op.2, both of them completed in 1959, is written according to pure 12-note principles, it is doubtful that Kurtág would have had the courage to construct these works as successions of tiny movements (six in the Quartet, eight in the Quintet) without Webern’s authoritative example.

Short in duration does not of course mean short in interest or, indeed, emotional involvement. One of the shortest, the opening Lento, which develops a melodic cell introduced in the opening bars, is relatively cool in emotional terms, it is true. The only slightly longer Agitato, however, begins with dramatic gestures involving all five instruments and then, on the intervention of a flutter-tongue flute, turns its attention to expressive lines on horn and oboe. Propelled by the ostinato rhythm introduced by horn, the Vivo movement retains its urgency even through a curious episode of wailing figures on oboe and bassoon. The heart of the work is the Molto sostenuto, which is basically an eloquently shaped horn solo with clear echoes of Bartók in the melodic line. In the next movement, an improvisation round the opening bassoon solo, the players have an opportunity not only to prolong the emotional situation but also to expand on it in their own way. The Mesto presents a desolate scene featuring little more than sustained notes on bassoon or horn and a repeated monotone on flute until, with a peremptory horn call, the tempo quickens into the even shorter, though frenzied, last movement.

Lento

Agitato

Vivo

Molto sostenutu

Rubato, improvisando

Grave, ma con slancio

Mesto –

Rubato, molto agitato

Early Kurtág though it is, the Wind Quintet is by no means as early as its opus number suggests. Behind the numbered works there is a pre-history of music – including a Viola Concerto much influenced by Bartók – which he wrote when he still subscribed to the artistic principles of the Communist regime in Hungary. One thing that changed his mind was the ruthless suppression of the uprising in 1956 – although, unlike his friend and colleague György Ligeti, he chose to stay in Hungary. Another formative experience, a year later, was a period of study in Paris where he attended the classes of Messiaen, Milhaud and Max Deutsch. He surely learned more, however, from the art psychologist Marianne Stein, whose advice that he should build his works round small units coincided decisively with his discovery of Webern at the concerts of the Domaine Musical and elsewhere. While neither the String Quartet Op.1 nor the Wind Quintet Op.2, both of them completed in 1959, is written according to pure 12-note principles, it is doubtful that Kurtág would have had the courage to construct these works as successions of tiny movements (six in the Quartet, eight in the Quintet) without Webern’s authoritative example.

Short in duration does not of course mean short in interest or, indeed, emotional involvement. One of the shortest movements of the Wind Quintet, the opening Lento, which develops a melodic cell introduced in the opening bars, is relatively cool in emotional terms, it is true. The only slightly longer Agitato, however, begins with dramatic gestures involving all five instruments and then, on the intervention of a flutter-tongue flute, turns its attention to expressive lines on horn and oboe. Propelled by the ostinato rhythm introduced by horn, the Vivo movement retains its urgency even through a curious episode of wailing figures on oboe and bassoon. The heart of the work is the Molto sostenuto, which is basically an eloquently shaped horn solo with clear echoes of Bartók in the melodic line. In the next movement, an improvisation round the opening bassoon solo, the players have an opportunity not only to prolong the emotional situation but also to expand on it in their own way. The Mesto presents a desolate scene featuring little more than sustained notes on bassoon or horn and a repeated monotone on flute until, with a peremptory horn call, the tempo quickens into the even shorter, though frenzied, last movement.