Fourth String Quartet
- Instrumentation
- 2Vn,Va,Vc
- Year
- 2000
- Duration
- 22:00
- Composed
- 8/6/1999 - 11/9/1999
- Dedication
- Brentano String Quartet
- Commission
- El Paso pro-Musica, Chamber Music Society of Detroit, Chamber Music Northwest, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center
Fourth String Quartet
I composed my fourth string quartet during 1999, for the Brentano Quartet, with whom I had had previous happy associations; the piece was commissioned by a consortium of chamber music presenters, including the auspices for this evening's program. At somewhat over twenty minutes playing time, the quartet's single movement necessarily involves a wide variety of attitudes, gestures, textures, and speeds. But overall one can detect a directed progress from slower to faster, from sparer to denser -- although with many detours -- and finally to a kind of repose. Stasis is not victorious, however, for the work ends (some might say) with the musical analogue of a question.
Charles Wuorinen
New York
September 2000
