Piano Quintet in G minor, Op.57

Prelude

Fugue

Scherzo

Intermezzo

Finale

Shostakovich’s Piano Quintet is so well written for piano and strings that it is difficult to believe that it was conceived in the first place as a string quartet. The original suggestion for the work came, however, from the Beethoven Quartet, who had enjoyed such a success with Shostakovich’s First String Quartet that they wanted another of the same kind. During the course of composition in the summer of 1940 the piano part was added, Shostakovich later explained, “so that I would have the chance to take part myself and travel on concert tours.”

Of course, it cannot have been as simple as that. There must have been something in the material that positively invited the participation of the piano, which in its turn required a larger structure in five rather than the usual four movements. It is possible that, as originally conceived, the work began (in the manner of Beethoven’s Op.131) with the profoundly meditative Fugue which is now the second movement. The Prelude, with its opening piano flourish and its Bach keyboard allusions, would presumably have been added later. In the Fugue itself the presence of the piano, which makes a particularly magical first entry, adds not only textural variety but a structural dimension too.

The short and vigorously playful Scherzo, the one really quick movement of the five, acts as a central pivot as the work turns back on itself. Although the Intermezzo is not quite as serious as the Fugue, it balances it in its thoughtful use of baroque conventions. Similarly, although the Finale is rather more cheerful than the Prelude, and more classical than baroque in form, it finds enough in common with the first movement to seal the long-term unity of the construction.