4/11/2024 0 Comments Ravel string quartet sibelius file![]() ![]() Themes from the first movement subtly insinuate themselves into the rhapsodic pathways of the moody slow movement. ![]() In the virtuosic movement that follows, biting pizzicatos, bewitching modality, and perfumed exoticism reflect the contemporary fascination in Paris for things Far Eastern, as well as Ravel’s own attraction to the music of Rimsky-Korsakov. The opening Allegro cloaks its sonata form in lush lyricism. Ravel’s imaginative and expert handling of string resources and sounds foretells of dazzling future orchestrations. When a few suggested extensive revisions, Debussy admonished the young composer, “In the name of the gods of music, and in mine, do not change a single note of what you have written.”įor all its youthful ardor, the Quartet displays astonishing technical maturity. Nonetheless, the public eagerly embraced the Quartet.Ĭritics, however, were sharply divided at the 1904 Paris premiere. When he submitted the initial movement for a composition prize at the Paris Conservatory, jury members thought the piece a bit too close to the modernist camp for comfort, and Ravel found himself expelled from that esteemed institution for a second time. Although the dedication reads: “To my dear teacher, Gabriel Fauré,” it is Debussy’s Quartet in G Minor that influenced Ravel, with its fascinating tone colors and cyclical use of opening thematic material, recurring in subsequent movements.ĭespite a rough start, the Quartet in F proved to be Ravel’s first major success as a composer. Ravel was 27 when he commenced work on the Quartet in F in late 1902. Pavane for a Dead Princess was commissioned in 1899 for Princess de Polignac’s elegant soirées, while the remarkably fresh Jeux d’eau made a splash in radical circles two years later. Predictably, his first works to gain wide popularity were for piano. While still a student, however, he decided against a career as a concert virtuoso and opted to devote his life to composing. In his youth, Ravel showed great promise as both pianist and composer. This unifying thread of recycled themes continues into the brilliant finale. ![]() The virtuosic movement that follows reflects the contemporary fascination in Paris for things Far Eastern, as well as Ravel’s own attraction to the music of Rimsky-Korsakov. Nonetheless, the public eagerly embraced the Quartet. The Quartet in F proved to be Ravel’s first major success as a composer, although his submission of the work for a composition prize led to his expulsion (a second time) from the Paris Conservatory. The quartet has remained, in Orenstein's phrase, "a standard work in the chamber music repertory".Ravel was 27 when he commenced work on the Quartet in F in late 1902, under the influence of Debussy’s Quartet in G minor, with its fascinating tone colors and cyclical use of opening thematic material, recurring in subsequent movements. By 1914, the work was so well established that a London critic was able to compare performances by the Parisian String Quartet with those of British players in consecutive months. The work had its London premiere in 1908 (the reviewer in The Musical Times found the music "chiefly remarkable for vagueness of significance, incoherence, and weird harmonic eccentricities") and its German premiere in Berlin in 1910. Debussy") but Jean Marnold of the Mercure de France praised the work and described Ravel as "one of the masters of tomorrow". Pierre Lalo, already a staunch opponent of Ravel, dismissed it as derivative ("it offers an incredible resemblance to the music of M. Its dedicatee, Fauré, attended the performance but was not greatly taken with the piece. The quartet was premiered by the Heymann Quartet at a concert of the Société Nationale de Musique on 5 March 1904. ![]()
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