Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904)
String Quintet in G major, op. 77 (1877, rev. 1885)
Dvorak wrote this piece, his second string quintet, just around the time his musical fortunes started to turn. Indeed, between 1874 and ’75, he began to gain international notice (primarily in Austria) from prizes his music won and that notoriety eventually brought his name to the attention of Brahms, who, in turn, scored Dvorak a contract with his publisher, Simrock. The rest, as they say, is history.
In fact, the G-major Quintet was composed expressly for a competition, one sponsored by the Prague-based Artistic Circle. It earned Dvorak the prize plus effusive praise for the music’s “distinction of theme, technical skill in polyphonic composition, and mastery of form.” The jury also noted the score’s “knowledge of…instruments,” perhaps a nod to the piece’s unique scoring: in addition to the standard string quartet, Dvorak included a double bass, rather than a second viola or cello. That decision gives the Quintet a special sonority, one that’s expansive and peculiarly well-suited to its composer’s sunny musical language.
And the wisdom of his instrumental choices is apparent from the start. After a brief introduction, the first movement kicks off with a propulsive first theme that mixes vigorous triple and duple patterns. This rhythmic tension, as you’ll hear, will mark the much of the music that follows. It certainly is apparent in the second theme, a Schubert-like patter of triplet eighth notes that, over its second half, is accompanied by a counterpoint of driving quadruple sixteenth-note rhythms beginning in the first violin.
The development is suitably substantial and dramatic, weaving its way through several key areas and, just before transitioning to the recapitulation, featuring two passages – the first of triplets, the second of eighth notes – of roiling, furious intensity.
In the recapitulation, Dvorak expanded upon some of the material heard earlier during the exposition (there’s a particularly lovely episode of rising gestures in the upper strings between the reprise of the first and second themes) before rounding everything out with a lively coda.
The heavily-syncopated Scherzo is marked by many skipping, rustic motives. At two points there’s a bit of a reprieve: once in between iterations of the main Scherzo tune and again throughout the flowing trio.
For the slow third movement, Dvorak wrote a subtle, beautiful essay that’s built on a seemingly effortless melody derived from a rising scale figure. This motive turns up in nearly all of the section’s foreground and background textures, culminating in a radiant, surging apotheosis in E major.
After this comes a buoyant finale. Its opening melody comes from the beginning of the second movement – the first five notes are, in fact, identical – and much of its subsequent material either directly quotes or alludes to themes and motives heard earlier.
Though parts of it are nominally in E minor, no clouds really darken the movement’s pages. Certainly there are none over the closing minute or so, several moments of which anticipate harmonic progressions familiar from pieces like the later “American” Quartet. The last, rousing bars conclude with an echo of the first movement’s final gesture, an appropriately robust – and cyclical – figure with which to wrap up this liveliest of finales.
© Jonathan Blumhofer
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