String Quartets Nos. 7 – 9, Opus 59

The B-flat quartet, sixth of the series, is particularly significant for the somber adagio beginning of its otherwise jubilant allegretto finale.

beethoven has headed this introduction which is called dramatically during the movement melancholy this piece must be played with the greatest delicacy this eerie and wholly romantic movement is a true glimpse of the beethoven into whose newer world we shall presently penetrate with the three monumental quartets of opus fifty nine we have entered this new sphere they belong to the year eighteen o six which means that they are of the epoch of the fourth and fifth symphonies the third leonore overture and the violin concerto and the g major concerto for piano beethoven dedicated them to the russian count razumovski whose name is thus imperishably linked with these masterpieces and it was perhaps as a compliment to this nobleman that he introduced into the first and second of these works authentic russian themes indeed the scherzo of the e minor quartet utilizes that great melody around which more than a half century later mzorgsky was to build the coronation scene of his opera boris the razumovsky trilogy exhibits beethoven's inventive and technical faculties at the ideal symmetry they have achieved at the flood-tide of his so-called second period the f major c major and e minor quartets are in some ways the most ideally balanced ones he ever wrote and with all their splendor of form and substance they are still replete with the most astonishing originalities and departures indeed the amazing allegretto scherzando movement of the f major quartet so astounded the players who first undertook to perform it that they imagined beethoven's rhythmic motto theme was intended as a joke at their expense and almost refused to go through with it the adagio on the other hand develops with the utmost richness of sonority and color possible to four stringed instruments two gorgeously song-like themes till it seems as if they had become expanded to orchestral dimensions the e minor quartet less a display piece than its companion works is in a totally different and quite as unprecedented manner while its slow movement molto adagio sounds a deep spiritual note which seems to have been inspired in the composer by a nocturnal contemplation of a starry sky in the country around baden near vienna As for the C major quartet, the third of the Razumovsky set, it closes in a jubilant, sweeping fugue which is like a paean of triumph.

There are two E-flat quartets in Beethoven's output.

The first, Op.

I'm John Burge.

On today's date in 1806, Ludwig von Beethoven offered his publisher, Breitkopf & Hertel, three new string quartets, works we know today as the three Razumovsky Quartets, that were eventually issued as Beethoven's Op.

59.

In Beethoven's day, Vienna was swarming with Russian, Polish, and Hungarian aristocrats with a taste for music.

The most recognizable of the Russian tunes Beethoven employed occurs in the scherzo of the second quartet.

It's the same theme that was later quoted by Mussorgsky in the coronation scene of his opera Boris Gorynov.

When these Razumovsky quartets were premiered in Vienna in 1807, one contemporary review noted, "...these very long and difficult quartets are profoundly thought through and composed with enormous skill." but will not be intelligible to everyone.

When one Italian violinist confessed to Beethoven that he found them incomprehensible, Beethoven retorted, oh, they're not for you, but for a later age.

Previously, he had published numbers 1 through 6 all as one set, and that was opus 18, and that is what we call his early quartets.

And then he had the Razumovsky quartets.

which were string quartets number seven through nine, and those were all published together as Opus 59, I believe it was.

And so those were considered part of his middle quartets, and now we have number 10, which was also a middle quartet.