Allegro
Adagio molto
Scherzo – alla bulgarese
Andante
Finale. Allegro vivace

Bartók composed his Fifth Quartet quickly: between 6 August and 6 September 1934. It was commissioned by Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge and dedicated to her. The first performance was given at the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. by the Kolisch Quartet on 8 April 1935. The opening uses emphatically repeated B flats to introduce a closely-argued first movement. The repeated notes return, this time on E naturals and the music becomes increasingly animated. At the close, all four instruments converge on a B flat. The second movement is a magnificent example of Bartók’s ‘night music’, full of mysterious trills and whispered flourishes over sustained chords, rising to a climax before sinking again into the darkness, ending when the cello slithers down a scale into silence. The third movement is a lively dance in a rhythm derived from Bulgarian folk music – in this case 4+3+2/8. The Andante is another piece of ‘night music’, this time punctuated by unexpected pizzicatos and gently shuddering repeated chords. As in the second movement, there is an intense fortissimo climax before the shuddering chords and pizzicato cello glissandos and a solitary violin B natural bring the movement to an enigmatic close. The fifth movement has similar energy and tension of the first, and the whole quartet can be seen as a gigantic arch form. To underline this, the final flourish brings all four instruments to the B flat from which the work began.

Nigel Simeone ©