Adagio – Allegro vivace

Adagio non lento

Intermezzo. Allegretto con moto – Allegro di molto

Presto – Adagio non lento

Mendelssohn composed this quartet in 1827, while he was still in his teens but two years after the Octet. Written just months after the death of Beethoven, the work heavily influenced by Beethoven’s late quartets which so fascinated the young Mendelssohn at the same time as they shocked and appalled many of his older contemporaries. The A minor Quartet opens with a slow introduction that quotes from a Mendelssohn song (“Ist es wahr?” – “Is it true?” – an echo of Beethoven’s “Muss es sein?” in Op.135). The three-note motif that Mendelssohn derives from his song reappears in all four movements. After the drama of the first movement and the Adagio with its stern central fugal section, the Intermezzo brings us closer to the world of the Octet’s Scherzo or the Overture to A Midsummer Night’s Dream that dates from the same period. The finale is modelled directly on the finale of Beethoven’s Op.132 Quartet, also in A minor. After an unusual violin cadenza over a tremolo accompaniment, the main part of the movement is driving and passionate, its main themes owing much to Beethoven’s example, until Mendelssohn – in a daring move – dissolves the musical action before a brief concluding Adagio where the “Ist es wahr?” music from the start makes a poignant return.

Nigel Simeone © 2012