Amanda Tipton

Saturday, December 7, 2019, 8pm Sunday, December 8, 2019, 3pm Hertz Hall

Takács Quartet The Complete String Quartets of Béla Bartók

Edward Dusinberre, violin Harumi Rhodes, violin Geraldine Walther, viola András Fejér, cello

This performance is made possible, in part, by Patron Sponsors Charles and Helene Linker. Cal Performances’ 2019–20 season is sponsored by Wells Fargo.

23 PROGRAMS

Saturday, December 7

String Quartet No. 1, Sz. 40 (Op. 7) Lento Allegretto—Introduzione Allegro vivace

String Quartet No. 3, Sz. 8 Prima parte: Moderato Seconda parte: Allegro Recapitulazione della prima parte: Moderato Coda: Allegro molto

INTERMISSION String Quartet No. 5, Sz. 102, BB 110 Allegro Adagio molto Scherzo: alla bulgarese Andante Finale: Allegro vivace

Sunday, December 8

String Quartet No. 2, Sz. 67 (Op. 17) Moderato Allegro molto capriccioso Lento

String Quartet No. 4, Sz. 91 Allegro Prestissimo, con sordino Non troppo lento Allegretto pizzicato Allegro molto

INTERMISSION String Quartet No. 6, Sz. 114, BB 119 Mesto—Più mosso, pesante—Vivace Mesto—Marcia Mesto—Burletta—Moderato Mesto

The Takács Quartet appears by arrangement with Seldy Cramer Artists, and records for Hyperion and Decca/London Records. The Takács Quartet is Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Colorado in Boulder; the members are Associate Artists at Wigmore Hall, London. www.takacsquartet.com

24 PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES

Th e Complete String Quartets of Béla Bartók of sonority; daring harmonically yet grounded (1881–1945) in tradition; enormous in their range of ex- Th ere is a particular exhilaration that comes pression. Th ey are fundamental documents with performing the six Bartók string quartets of modern music, integral to the study of the that make up the complete cycle. Our perfor- discipline and the subject of many learned trea- mances have been infl uenced by working reg- tises. But the true importance of these master- ularly with the Hungarian folk group Muzsikas, pieces lies not in their demonstrable mastery whose sense of adventure and joyful abandon of the craft of composition, not in the fi erce has, we hope, crept into our performances of intellect that attended their creation, but in these monuments of 20th-century quartet the way they allow us to share the spirit of one literature. extraordinary man who affi rmed his life—and As with Beethoven cycle programs, we ar- ours—by wresting order from change and con- range the order of the quartets to give a sense tradiction. of Bartók’s musical journey. In the fi rst pro- Change and contradiction came to Bartók gram, the late Romanticism of the Quartet both as a Hungarian, with the waning of the No. 1 is rudely shattered by the explosive old ways of life that provided the bedrock of modernist tendencies of No. 3. To conclude the nation’s culture, and as a musician, with the program, No. 5 shows Bartók at the peak the erosion of the traditional tonal system of his compositional powers, with its extraor- upon which compositions had been founded dinary spectrum of colors, rhythmic vitality, for nearly three centuries. Bartók confronted and range of emotion. Th e second program both of these potential threats in the quartets begins with the Quartet No. 2, which presents by drawing melodic, rhythmic, and textural melancholy and yearning lyricism in the outer inspiration from the indigenous songs and movements and a capricious second move- dances that he collected during his decades ment giddy with excitement and momentum. of fi eld research on the subject, and then forg- We follow this with No. 4, itself a striking ing those musical elements into logical forms journey from its rigid, uncompromising fi rst molded from new tonal alloys that melded con- movement and spectral, nightmarish second vention and innovation. to the humanizing cello solo in the middle In so doing, he mirrored his own life: by movement. Th e humorous fourth movement showing in the Quartets Nos. 1 and 2 (com- and festive dance fi nale leave performers and posed when he was 27 and 34, and the only two audience alike in a completely diff erent place of the quartets bearing opus numbers) how the from where we began. folk sources to which he had devoted his early Of course, the cycle must end with the Sixth years could affi rm his coming of age by provid- Quartet, where Bartók achieved an unprec- ing the basis for establishing his distinctive cre- edented degree of emotional depth—a sense ative voice; by showing in the Quartets Nos. 3 of resignation and even withdrawal from the and 4 (ages 46 and 47) how that musical speech world. could be made to encompass the most rigorous —Takács Quartet discipline and individualism; and by showing in the Quartets Nos. 5 and 6 (ages 53 and 58) * * * how the experience of life (and art) could both sharpen and mellow the personality to refl ect Th e string quartets of Béla Bartók are monu- the wisdom of maturity. Bartók’s six string ments of music, virtually unsurpassed by any quartets transcend the mere notes that are their body of work of any other composer: unim- medium to record the unfolding and renewing peachable in their form and technique, with of a human spirit, a process of creativity and the tiniest motivic atom set spinning elegantly communication that perfectly embodies the through the universe of an all-embracing composer’s artistic credo: “I cannot conceive of structure; ingenious yet masterful in their use music that expresses absolutely nothing.”

25 PROGRAM NOTES

String Quartet No. 1, Sz. 40 (Op. 7) minor Quartet, Op. 131. Formal contrast is Th e year 1907, when he was 26, was a crucial provided by the movement’s central section, time both personally and professionally for based on a descending theme in worried Béla Bartók. In January, he was appointed to rhythms (marked “very impassioned”) initiated the faculty of the Budapest Academy of Music by the viola above a drone in the cello. (As a as a teacher of piano, and he soon became means of unifying the overall structure of the recognized as one of Hungary’s most talented quartet, the opening interval of this melody— keyboard virtuosos and pedagogues. By 1907, a falling half-step—serves as the germ from he had begun to establish himself as a com- which the themes of the two later movements poser and a folk music researcher, though his grow.) A return of the opening canon, fl oating original works to that time, largely under the high in the violins, rounds out the movement’s sway of late German Romanticism, had not yet form. An inconclusive harmony leads without revealed his distinctive creative personality. He pause to the next movement. was then also much occupied with thoughts Th e form of the spectral Allegretto is related of Hungarian nationalism (he even eschewed to Classical sonata-allegro with three themes: business suits for a short period in favor of a falling melody of short phrases introduced traditional peasant dress), and the manner in by the second violin aft er a hesitant introduc- which the music he was documenting on his tion; a fl owing waltz-like strain given by the research trips through the Transylvanian coun- inner strings above an ostinato murmur from tryside could be most eff ectively incorporated the cello and fi rst violin; and a quiet, subdued into his original works. motive accompanied by pizzicato notes from Th e String Quartet No. 1, Bartók’s fi rst pub- the cello. Aft er a tightly woven development lished chamber work and his earliest generally section, however, the themes are recapitulated recognized masterpiece, is an important docu- not in their expected order, but in reverse, a ment of that formative time in his life. Th ough technique that creates a structural symme- certainly touched by elements of program- try (1–2–3–development–3–2–1) for which matic autobiography (Ernö Lendvai found in Bartók showed great fondness in many of his it “fi rst descent—then ascent. Th e entire work later compositions. possesses a dramatic [progression] because the It is in the fi nale that Bartók moved beyond ‘return to life’ [Kodály’s description of the fi - the extended Romantic style of the earlier nale] is brought about by catharsis, a purifying movements toward the characteristic com- fever”), the quartet is, above all, a purely musi- positional idiom, grown from the distinctive cal record of the profound evolution of Bartók’s melodic leadings and fi ery dance rhythms of stylistic language from its Germanic, Romantic Hungarian folk music, that informs his great- origins to its mature basis in the quintessential est works. Th e movement is introduced by a elements of Hungarian folk song. Elliott An- preludial paragraph in which the cello makes tokoletz paired it with Strauss’ Elektra, also bardic pronouncements that are separated by completed in 1909, as “epitomizing late Ro- excited punctuations from the upper strings. mantic music on the threshold of a new chro- Th e main part of the movement is a sort of matic idiom.” modern sonata-rondo whose structural de- Th e fi rst movement is a darkly emotional marcations are oft en blurred by the continuous essay grown from the harmonic richness of thematic working-out. Th e movement’s sec- Wagner’s Tristan, and not unrelated to the ripe ond theme, however, a folkish tune similar to Expressionism of Schoenberg’s 1899 Verklärte the one on which Kodály based his “Peacock” Nacht. Th e work begins with a close canon Variations of 1939, is placed in high relief by in slow tempo on a lamenting theme, whose its slow tempo and Impressionistic trilled ac- imitative technique was probably infl uenced companiment. (Bartók was much interested in by the fugue that opens Beethoven’s C-sharp the music of the new French composers during

26 PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES the work’s composition. He purchased a copy does not make use of a real peasant melody but of Debussy’s String Quartet in October 1907.) invents his own imitation of such melodies…. Th ough the First String Quartet is among the Th ere is yet a third way in which the infl uence earliest of Bartók’s works to exhibit the stylis- of peasant music can be traced in a composer’s tic gestures that were to place him among the work. Neither peasant melodies nor imitations great composers of the modern era, it is music of peasant melodies can be found in his music, of undeniable personality and remarkable ar- but it is pervaded by the atmosphere of peasant tistic vision and craft smanship. music.” Th e String Quartet No. 2 is among the earliest examples of this last method of incor- String Quartet No. 2, Sz. 67 (Op. 17) porating folk infl uences into concert music. Th e During the early years of the 20th century, work was composed in the Budapest suburb of Bartók became obsessed with the folk music of Rákoskeresztúr between 1915 and 1917, the his native Hungary. He and his friend and col- war years when Bartók largely withdrew from league in composition Zoltán Kodály trooped public concert life. Unable to travel to continue the hinterlands with, at fi rst, pen and paper, his research in folk music, he spent much of and, later, a primitive phonograph to record that time organizing the mountain of informa- the indigenous songs and dances that diff ered tion on the subject that he had collected during substantially from the four-square melodies the previous decade, and composed little. His that had been passed off for decades as authen- only important original works of that time were tic. What they found was music whose rhythms the ballet The Wooden Prince and the Second exhibited an invigorating irregularity, whose Quartet, which marked a signifi cant advance in modes eschewed conformity to the commonly his creative language through its permeation by accepted scale patterns in favor of a dizzy- subtilized folk idioms. “Th e whole direction of ing variety of pitch organizations, and whose Bartók’s later writing might be deduced from method of performance allowed for infl ections this one work,” wrote Halsey Stevens in his and expressions that not only enhanced the biography of the composer. Th e Second was basic song but also displayed the individuality the fi rst of Bartók’s six quartets to be recorded of the singer. With the dedication of a religious (in 1925 by the Amar Quartet, with Paul Hin- zealot, Bartók spent 40 years collecting, tran- demith as violist), and has probably enjoyed scribing, and codifying Central European and more performances than any other composi- North African folksongs, always mindful that tion in the set. these ages-old but fragile remnants of evolving Kodály said that the three strongly profi led cultures might vanish forever before he could movements of the Second Quartet represent: preserve them. “1. A quiet life. 2. Joy. 3. Sorrow.” Th e sonata Bartók’s own music absorbed the impact form of the opening movement is worked out of his research, and by the time of the First with Bartók’s characteristic rigor. Th e main World War, the infl uence of folk idioms on the theme, given by the fi rst violin, begins with a rhythms, melodies, and moods of his works quick leap upward followed by a long note and had become pervasive. “Th e question is, what a phrase descending through chromatically in- are the ways in which peasant music is taken fl ected melodic leadings. Th e other instruments over and becomes transmuted into modern are drawn into the discussion of this subject, music?” he asked in a 1920 article. “We may, and lead directly to the second theme, a mel- for instance, take over a peasant melody un- ody in smoother motion in which is imbedded changed or only slightly varied, write an ac- a little turn fi gure in triplet rhythm. Th e devel- companiment to it and possibly some opening opment section is largely occupied with tightly and concluding phrases…. Another method by reasoned permutations of the principal theme. which peasant music becomes transmuted into Th e recapitulation returns the earlier material, modern music is the following: Th e composer though the second theme is truncated to just

27 PROGRAM NOTES a brief reminiscence, with the balance of the to the spirit of experimentation, and he shift ed movement devoted to a developmental coda his professional concentration at that time grown from the main subject. from ethnomusicology to composition and Th e Allegro that occupies the center of the his career as a pianist. He was particularly in- quartet bears the immediate imprint of folk terested in the music of Stravinsky, notably the music: its form is a chain of continuous sec- mosaic structures and advanced harmonies of tions arranged as a loose rondo, like a peasant the Diaghilev ballets, and in the recent Vien- dance with a returning refrain; its rhythm is nese developments in atonality and motivic ferocious (the Allegro barbaro was composed generation posited by Arnold Schoenberg and only four years before; the Rumanian Dances his friend/disciple Alban Berg. A decided mod- of 1915 include a Stamping Dance); its melodic ernism entered Bartók’s music with his searing material is contained within a limited range 1919 ballet, Th e Miraculous Mandarin, and his and circles around a few central pitches; its works of the years immediately following—the phrasing consists of small repeated units. Th e two violin sonatas, the piano suite Out of Doors, movement ends with an extraordinary coda the First Piano Concerto, and the String Quar- that plays a quiet transformation of the main tets Nos. 3 and 4—are the most daring that he theme at such breakneck pace that the music ever wrote. He was reluctant to program them becomes a buzzing murmur. for any but the most sophisticated audiences. Th e fi nale is bleak and sorrowful, music Bartók wrote the Th ird Quartet quickly in of intense expression that may refl ect the grief Budapest at the end of the summer of 1927, im- of the time of its composition. Th ough the mediately following a concert tour of Germany movement seems to unfold freely, pausing oc- during which he performed his new Piano casionally for a thoughtful breath, it is carefully Concerto No. 1 with Furtwängler in Frank- generated from a small cache of melodic ges- furt and his Piano Sonata in Baden-Baden. tures: tiny, two-note motives, given by the sec- In December 1927, Bartók began his fi rst visit ond violin, that use the intervals of a third (in to the United States, concertizing nationwide its confl icting minor and major versions) and for three months aft er making his American a fourth; a brief arching phrase, posited by the debut with the New York Philharmonic and fi rst violin, that recalls the principal theme of Willem Mengelberg in Carnegie Hall on De- the fi rst movement; and a falling fi gure of two cember 22nd in his own Rhapsody for Piano short notes followed by a longer note. and Orchestra. (It was one of the ironies of Bartók’s life that both his last home and the String Quartet No. 3, Sz. 8 hospital in which he died in 1945 were just Aft er the fi endish winds of the First World across the street from the famed auditorium War had fi nally blown themselves out in 1918, that hosted his introduction to this country.) there came into music a new invigoration and Before returning to Hungary in February 1928, an eagerness by composers to stretch the forms Bartók learned of a lucrative competition for and language of the ancient art. Stravinsky, new chamber works sponsored by the Musi- Schoenberg, Webern, Prokofi ev, Shostakov- cal Fund of Philadelphia, and he submitted ich, Copland, and other of the most import- his Th ird Quartet for consideration aft er he ar- ant modern masters challenged listeners and rived home. He heard nothing for some time, colleagues throughout the 1920s with their however, and so sent a copy of the work to daring visions and their brilliant iconoclasms. Universal Edition in Vienna, inquiring if that It was the most exciting decade in the entire fi rm would be willing to publish the score and history of music. Bartók, whose folksong re- help promote its fi rst performance. Th en, on searches were severely limited geographically October 2nd, news arrived that Bartók’s piece by the loss of Hungarian territories through and a string quartet by the Italian composer the treaties following the war, was not immune Alfredo Casella had been chosen by a panel

27b PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES

(which included Mengelberg, Fritz Reiner, where the lower strings remove their mutes. and Frederick Stock) from over 600 entries to Th e fi rst section is largely based on the exten- share the considerable fi rst prize of $6,000. In sive permutations of this pregnant thematic view of the international recognition accorded kernel through imitation, inversion, augmen- the work, Universal agreed to issue the score tation, diminution, and other processes that immediately; the piece was premiered at Lon- Bartók learned from Bach. Part II, which don’s Wigmore Hall by the Waldbauer Quartet follows without pause, is a free, continuously on February 19, 1929. unfolding variation of an arch-shaped folk- Bartók’s Th ird Quartet is among the great dance melody presented in pizzicato multiple masterworks of modern music—brilliant, stops by the cello. A passage of dizzying slides challenging, cathartic, one of the most diffi cult and almost brutal dissonance bridges to Part yet rewarding pieces in the entire chamber lit- III, which is a thoroughly reworked version of erature. Th ough the music is Bartók’s furthest Part I (Bartók marked this section “Ricapitula- adventure into modernity, it is founded solidly zione della prima parte,” but also noted, “I do not on the confl uence of two traditional but seem- like to repeat a musical idea without change”), ingly opposed musical streams—the folk music a distillation of the essence of the quartet’s ear- of Eastern Europe, a subject on which Bartók lier material. Th e concluding Coda starts as a was a scholar of the highest accomplishment, vague bow-tip buzzing, but soon develops into and the elaborate contrapuntal constructions of a furious altered restatement of the folk dance Johann Sebastian Bach and other Baroque com- of Part II. Th e quartet culminates in a powerful, posers. By 1927, the time of the Th ird Quartet, viscerally compelling cadence. Bartók had so thoroughly absorbed the quirky intervals, tightly circling motivic phrases, snap- String Quartet No. 4, Sz. 91 ping rhythms, and ornate decorations of indig- Folk infl uence pervades the Fourth Quar- enous Hungarian music into his original work tet, composed during the summer of 1928, that his themes constitute a virtual apotheosis soon aft er Bartók returned from his fi rst tour of native folksong. “Th e melodic world of my of America as pianist and composer. It is ev- string quartets does not essentially diff er from ident in the small-interval melodic leadings, that of folksong,” he said, “only the framework gapped scales, and snapping rhythms of the is stricter.” For the working-out of his folk- fi rst movement; in the whirling motion and derived thematic materials (Bartók never fi ery syncopations of the two scherzos; in the quoted existing melodies unless specifi cally fl orid, chromatic melody of the central move- noting that they were arrangements), he turned ment, which evokes the melancholy pastorales to the highly organized models of canon and of the tárogató, a Hungarian single-reed wood- fugue postulated by Bach and his contempo- wind instrument (the composer’s biographer raries. Th e Th ird Quartet therefore represents Halsey Stevens wrote that it was “somewhat a marvelous synthesis of West and East—the like a straight wooden saxophone”) that Bartók structural integrity and emotional range of encountered during his fi eld researches. Th e Bach wedded to the melodic and rhythmic ex- tendency of themes constructed from these oticisms of Slavic folksong. tiny folk gestures when subjected to the devel- One of Bartók’s most tightly constructed opmental and harmonic pressures applied by works, the Th ird Quartet is disposed as a large Bartók is, however, to fragment and fl y apart. single span divided into four sections. Part To counterbalance this problem, Bartók used I opens with a mysterious harmonic curtain for this work a rigorous overall formal struc- that serves as an introduction to the work’s ture that describes an arch shape centered upon germinal theme—a tiny fragment comprising the third of its fi ve movements: fast–scherzo– a rising fourth and a falling minor third initi- slow–scherzo–fast. Th e fi rst and fi ft h move- ated by the violin in measure six, at the point ments are paired in their mood, tempo and

28 PROGRAM NOTES thematic material, an association further en- of the Scherzo and Trio is already symmetrical hanced by sharing the same music in their clos- (A–B–A), and Bartók drew the symmetry into ing pages. Th e second and fourth movements, the smallest levels of the movement by echo- both scherzos, are related in their themes, their ing the upward-arching, one-measure theme head-long rhythmic propulsion and their use of with its descending inversion. The central novel eff ects from the strings: the second move- Trio is distinguished by its quicker tempo, in- ment is played throughout with mutes, while cessant ribbon of violin notes, and rustic folk the fourth movement requires a continuous dance in limping rhythms. Th e Andante posits pizzicato, including the percussive snapping of three thematic ideas that transform motives the strings against the fi ngerboard that Bartók from the Adagio (repeated pizzicato; bouncing was among the fi rst composers to use. Th e slow bows; murmured scales and canonic treatment movement, the mid-point of the structure, is of the Adagio’s third theme) and their trun- itself organized symmetrically in three parts cated returns to round out the movement. At (A–B–A) around the twittering “night music” the center stands a new snapping theme that of its central section. is developed and woven with the movement’s other ideas. Th e fi nale is a free rondo with so- String Quartet No. 5, Sz. 102, BB 110 nata elements based on a fi ery dance melody Th e movements of the Quartet No. 5, like those constructed from small, twisting intervals. Just comprising the Fourth Quartet, the Second as the movement reaches its climax (in a pas- Piano Concerto, and the Concerto for Orches- sage whose ferocious rhythms recall Beetho- tra, are arranged according to a broad, sym- ven’s Fift h Symphony), the music stops for a metrical plan, a so-called “arch form,” in which grotesque, barrel-organ transformation of the the central movement is fl anked, mirror-fash- fi rst episode’s theme before a blazing epilogue ion, by parallel balancing movements: fast– closes the quartet. slow–scherzo–slow–fast. Th e integrity of this structure is enhanced by having a theme from String Quartet No. 6, Sz. 114, BB 119 the fi rst movement reappear in the fi nale, and “Yes, those were horrible days for us, too, those by making the fourth movement a free varia- days when Austria was attacked,” Bartók re- tion of the second. Symmetrical procedures sponded from Budapest on April 13, 1938 extend as well to the internal working-out of to his loyal friend in Basle, Switzerland, Mrs. individual movements. The opening sona- Oscar Müller-Widmann. “Th e most frightful ta-form movement is based on three themes: a thing for us at the moment is that we face the motive of hammered repeated notes; a brusque threat of seeing Hungary also given over to rhythmic figure upon which are superim- this regime of bandits and murderers. I cannot posed short, winding melodic phrases; and a imagine how I could live in such a country…. smoothly fl owing strain in triplet rhythms. Strictly speaking, it would be my duty to exile Following the development section, the three myself, if that is still possible. But even under motives are recapitulated in reverse order and the most favorable auspices, it would cause me in inversion, and the movement is capped by a an enormous amount of trouble and moral vigorous coda: A–B–C–development–C–B–A– anguish to earn my daily bread in a foreign coda. Th e Adagio, a fi ne example of the rustling country…. All this adds up to the same old “night music” that Bartók favored for many of problem, whether to go or stay.” his slow movements, follows a similar plan, Given the unsettled and frightening politi- though with diff erent proportions and ex- cal situation under which all eastern Europeans pres–sive eff ect: A (trills and two-note atoms)– found themselves during the terrible days of B (chorale)–C (pizzicato glissandos, tremolos, 1938 and 1939, it is little wonder that Bartók’s and evanescent scale fragments)–B (abbrevi- creativity was undermined. He managed to ated)–A (abbreviated). Th e conventional form complete the Violin Concerto No. 2 in Decem-

28b PLAYBILL PROGRAM NOTES ber 1938, but then became too preoccupied premiered in New York on January 20, 1941 by with the deteriorating life around him to un- the Kolisch Quartet. dertake any further original work. Paul Sacher, Th e noted French musicologist Harry Hal- the conductor of the Basle Chamber Orchestra breich wrote that the Quartet No. 6 “appeals and a close friend who had commissioned the to us as an intensely moving human docu- Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta two ment with a foundation that is at least autobi- years before, recognized that Bartók needed ographical, if not also that of ‘program music.’ to leave Budapest if his creativity was to be re- Bartók’s iron grip, which formerly kept under vived, so he invited the composer and his wife control every outburst, however violent, of the to spend the summer of 1939 at his chalet at composer’s temperament, here gives way to a Saanen in the massif of Gruyère in Switzerland subjectivity and directness of expression that and then asked him to write a new work for make this one of the most moving and eas- his orchestra. Bartók accepted both of the in- ily appreciated of Bartók’s works.” Th e Sixth vitations and arrived at Saanen in July. Even in Quartet takes as its motto an arching, step- Switzerland, however, Bartók could not escape wise melody marked mesto—“sad”—given at the ominous European political situation. “Th e the beginning by the unaccompanied viola. poor, peaceful, honest Swiss are being com- Th is theme unifi es the whole composition by pelled to burn with war-fever,” he wrote to his reappearing in diff erent settings at the begin- son Béla in Hungary on August 18th. nings of the second and third movements, and Once installed at Saanen, however, Bartók by serving as the principal subject of the fi nale. retreated into a welcome isolation to un- Th e fi rst movement is a sonata form based dertake Sacher’s commission. “Fortunately on a fl ying main theme and a second theme I can put this [war] worry out of my mind if grown from the vibrant rhythms and winding I have to,” he continued in his letter to Béla. melodic leadings of Hungarian folksong. Th e “I have to work: a piece for Sacher himself dotted-rhythm Marcia, savagely ironic and (something for a string orchestra). Luckily the unsettlingly diabolical, is strongly contrasted work went well, and I fi nished it in 15 days. by the gapped-scale melody and rustling ac- I just completed it yesterday.” Th e work was companiment of the central trio. Th e bitter, the Divertimento for String Orchestra, one of menacing humor of the Burletta (“Burlesque”) Bartók’s most immediately accessible compo- is ameliorated, though not overcome, by the sitions. Th e halcyon Swiss interlude during pastoral music of the movement’s internal which he produced this piece was not to last, episodes. Th e fi nale unfolds dolefully from the however. Almost as soon as he had begun the Mesto theme, allowing ghostly reminiscences Sixth Quartet at Saanen, word came from Bu- of the two themes from the fi rst movement dapest of his beloved mother’s death. He re- before giving one fi nal loud wail and ebbing turned home, where he completed—though into silence. Each successive movement of the with considerable diffi culty—the quartet in Sixth Quartet is more melancholy in mood and November 1939. It was the last work that he slower in tempo—Vivace, Marcia, Moderato, wrote in Europe, and his last until the Con- Mesto—so that the work ends with a feeling of certo for Orchestra four years later. His situa- bleak resignation, perhaps indicating the grow- tion in Budapest became untenable during the ing pessimism that overcame Bartók during the following months, and in April 1940, he sailed time of its creation. “Nowhere in all Bartók’s to America for a concert tour with the violinist music is there a movement so restrained and Joseph Szigeti. Aft er an arduous journey home at the same time with such a powerful impact,” that summer to settle his aff airs and collect wrote Halsey Stevens of the fi nale in his study his wife, he went back to New York in October of the composer. and never again saw Hungary. Th e quartet was —© 2019 Dr. Richard E. Rodda

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ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Th e Takács Quartet, now in its forty-fi ft h sea- fi rst Hall of Fame, along with such legendary son, is renowned for the vitality of its interpre- artists as Jascha Heifetz, Leonard Bernstein, tations. Th eNew York Times recently praised and Dame Janet Baker. Th e ensemble also won the ensemble for “revealing the familiar as un- the 2011 Award for Chamber Music and Song familiar, making the most traditional of works presented by the Royal Philharmonic Society feel radical once more,” and the Financial Times in London. described a recent concert at London’s Wigmore The Takács Quartet performed Philip Hall: “Even in the most fi endish repertoire these Roth’s Everyman program with Meryl Streep players show no fear, injecting the music with at Princeton in 2014, and again with her at a heady sense of freedom. At the same time, the Royal Conservatory of Music in Toronto in though, there is an uncompromising attention 2015. The group is known for such innovative to detail: neither a note nor a bow-hair is out programming, and this program was conceived of place.” Based in Boulder at the University in close collaboration with the author. They fi rst of Colorado, Edward Dusinberre, Harumi performed Everyman at Carnegie Hall in 2007 Rhodes (violins), Geraldine Walther (viola), with Philip Seymour Hoffman. The Takács has and András Fejér (cello) perform 80 concerts a toured 14 cities with the poet Robert Pinsky, year worldwide. collaborates regularly with the Hungarian Folk During the 2019–20 season, the ensem- group Muzsikas, and in 2010 collaborated ble will continue its four annual concerts with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival and as Associate Artists at Wigmore Hall. Other David Lawrence Morse on a drama project that European appearances include Budapest, explored the composition of Beethoven’s last Florence, Milan, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, quartets. Aspects of the quartet’s interests and Geneva, Salzburg’s Mozartwoche, and Prague. history are explored in Edward Dusinberre’s Th e quartet’s extensive list of American engage- Beethoven for a Later Age: Th e Journey of a String ments includes a performance at New York’s Quartet, a book that takes the reader inside the Mostly Mozart Festival with Jeremy Denk and life of a professional string quartet, melding complete Bartók cycles in New York, Vancouver music history and memoir as it explores the (BC), Middlebury (VT), and Washington circumstances surrounding the composition of (DC). Other venues include Toronto, Atlanta, Beethoven’s quartets. Portland, Pasadena, Philadelphia, and the Uni– Th e Takács Quartet records for Hyperion versity of Illinois. Th e quartet will also perform Records, and its releases for that label include two concerts in Hong Kong and two concerts string quartets by Haydn, Schubert, Janáček, in Tokyo. Th e group’s most recent recording, re- Smetana, Debussy, and Britten, as well as piano leased in October 2019, features Dohnányi’s two quintets by César Franck and Shostakovich piano quintets with Marc-André Hamelin, and (with Marc-André Hamelin), and viola quin- his second string quartet. A recent tour with tets by Brahms (with Lawrence Power). For its Garrick Ohlsson culminated in a recording for CDs on the Decca/London label, the quartet Hyperion of the Elgar and Amy Beach piano has won three Gramophone Awards, a Grammy, quintets (to be released in 2020). three Japanese Record Academy Awards, Disc of In 2014, the Takács became the fi rst string the Year at the inaugural BBC Music Magazine quartet to win the Wigmore Hall Medal. Th e Awards, and Ensemble Album of the Year at honor, inaugurated in 2007, recognizes major the Classical Brits. Full details of all recordings international artists who have a strong asso- can be found in the recordings section of the ciation with the hall. Recipients so far include ensemble’s website. András Schiff , Th omas Quasthoff , Menahem Th e members of the Takács Quartet are Pressler, and Dame Felicity Lott. In 2012, Christoff ersen Faculty Fellows at the University Gramophone announced that the Takács was of Colorado Boulder. Th e quartet has helped to the only string quartet to be inducted into its develop a string program with a special empha-

Opposite: photo by Amanda Tipton 30 ABOUT THE ARTISTS sis on chamber music, where students work in a tention in 1977, winning First Prize and nurturing environment designed to help them the Critics’ Prize at the International String develop their artistry. Th rough the university, Quartet Competition in Evian, France. Th e two of the quartet’s members benefi t from the quartet also won the Gold Medal at the 1978 generous loan of instruments from the Drake Portsmouth and Bordeaux Competitions Instrument Foundation. Th e members of the and First Prizes at the Budapest International Takács are on the faculty at the Music Academy String Quartet Competition in 1978 and the of the West in Santa Barbara, where they run Bratislava Competition in 1981. Th e ensemble an intensive summer string quartet seminar, made its North American debut tour in 1982. and Visiting Fellows at the Guildhall School of In June 2020, violist Richard O’Neill will join Music. the Takács. In 2001, the quartet was awarded Th e Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 the Order of Merit of the Knight’s Cross of the at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest by Republic of Hungary, and in March 2011, each Gabor Takács-Nagy, Károly Schranz, Gabor member of the ensemble received the Order Ormai, and András Fejér, while all four were of Merit Commander’s Cross from the Presi- students. It first received international at- dent of the Republic of Hungary.

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