Tripping Through the Beethoven Quartets, Op. 59, nos. 1-3

Count Razumovsky in his earlier years

Nobleman Andrey Kirillovich Razumovsky's fifteen minutes of fame is, of course, related to the quartets that he commissioned from Beethoven.  That said, he was a much more important historical figure than is readily known.  His father, Cyril Razumovsky, had built a late Baroque palace which is a minor landmark on St. Petersburg's Nevsky Prospekt (the "main drag" of the city). In 1792 Andres Kyrillovitch was appointed the Tsar's diplomatic representative to the Habsburg court in Vienna, one of the crucial diplomatic posts during the Napoleonic era. He was a chief negotiator during the Congress of Vienna that resettled Europe in 1814, and asserted Russian rights in Poland. An accomplished amateur violinist himself, he established a house string quartet in 1808. But, of course, his commissioning three string quartets from Beethoven in 1806 was the act that has made his name familiar. He asked Beethoven to include a "Russian" theme in each quartet: Beethoven included Ukrainian themes in the first two (quite interesting given the current political situation in that part of the world). Razumovsky was the brother-in-law of another of Beethoven's patrons, Prince Joseph Lobkowitz. His first wife, Countess Elisabeth von Thun was a sister in law of Count Carl von Lichnowsky.

So, after five years (the Op. 18 quartets were published in 1801), Beethoven returned to the medium.  Published in 1808, these quartets are considered to make up a portion of Beethoven's "middle period," which, is defined by his increasing use of Romantic musical gestures and ideas. The use of these new ideas and his changing attitude towards composition led to Beethoven changing his composition style and his intended audience. His works, originally composed for what would be a supportive public, were now intended for (less lucrative) musical connoisseurs. By 1808, the 'Eroica' Symphony (premiering in 1805) was behind him and the famed fifth and sixth symphonies would appear that year in a mammoth concert at the Theater an der Wien on December 22.   The program of that now (in)famous event looked like this:

1. The Sixth Symphony, which was actually written before the fifth
2. Aria: "Ah, perfido", Op. 65
3. The Gloria movement of the Mass in C major
4. The Fourth Piano Concerto (played by Beethoven himself)
5. (Intermission)
6. The Fifth Symphony
7. The Sanctus and Benedictus movements of the C major Mass
8. A solo piano improvisation played by Beethoven
9. The Choral Fantasy

Ah, those were the days:  a concert of several hours in length, presented with only one rehearsal, in an unheated concert hall in Vienna in the winter.  What's the big deal about trying to recreate the historical practices of the past?  But, I digress....

June 14:  Op. 59, No. 1 in F major

"Beethoven produced his second set of string quartets, Op. 59, in 1806, just about six years after Op. 18. Without intending any injustice to Op. 18, moving to Op. 59 is like Dorothy, erstwhile inhabitant of a black-and-white Kansas, crashing down into the colorful Land of Oz. With Op. 59, we alight into the land of middle-period Beethoven and meet the crème-de-la-crème: The Op. 59 quartets stand next to the august tradition of Viennese chamber music quartets by Haydn, Mozart and earlier Beethoven like the Rocky Mountains rise above the central plains. They are longer, more technically challenging, dramatically and psychologically far more intense and they mark in more ways than one the elevation of quartet performance culture to its first plateau of daunting professionalism. The massive triptych of quartets comprising Op. 59 is the precise chamber music analog of the revolutionary Symphony No. 3 within the category of orchestral music. Written only a few years earlier, Beethoven’s Eroica symphony crash-landed into the Viennese symphonic tradition like a meteor from outer space, an awesome and imponderable monolith of grandeur and shock. This was Beethoven fully emerging, the most unrelenting musical pioneer of all time. The piano sonatas and mixed chamber music of this period all exhibit this “heroic” transformation so that, in a word, music is suddenly happening on a whole different scale of intensity, virtuosity and profundity."

~Kai Christiansen (I think; it's from Earsense Chamberbase)

"Beethoven's preoccupation with Fidelio from late 1804 until the spring of 1806 had dammed up work on other projects. A month after the last performance of the second version ofFidelio, Beethoven turned to the composition of three string quartets, later known as the Razumovsky Quartets, op. 59. He completed them toward the end of 1806.

There is one sense in which the Razumovsky Quartets represent a continuation of the heroic impulse: an application of the principles of composition elaborated in the Eroica Symphony to another genre, an expansion of the quartet from beyond its eighteenth-century traditional boundaries to a point where one may legitimately speak of these quartets as "symphonic quartets." But there is another sense in which these works represent a withdrawal from the heroic impulse, with its insistence upon strength and virtue, its "public" style and affirmative outlook. If the heroic symphonies are in Bekker's phrase "speeches to the nation," then the quartets are interior monologues addressed to a private self whose emotional states comprise a variegated tapestry of probing moods and feelings. Sullivan glimpsed this when he wrote that in the middle-period orchestral work 'the hero marches forth . . . performing his feats before the whole of an applauding world. What is he like in his loneliness? We find the answer in the Razumovsky Quartets.'

It was on a leaf of sketches for these works that Beethoven wrote a phrase which we have already cited in another context; 'let your deafness no longer be a secret-even in art.'

Here, in these quartets, he will reveal his deepest feelings, his sense of loss, his pains and his strivings."

~Maynard Solomon

Movement I (Allegro)

In a cursory examination of the first page of the score, one is struck by two "departures" from the earlier quartets.  Gone is any sense of an opening gesture to set the key or grab the listener's attention (the premier coup d'archet of Haydn and Mozart's time).  Instead the cello begins with a wistful tune, apparently in C, but is it?  The first violin follows suit, starting its version of the melody a step higher before actually inverting a portion of the original.  The harmony is hardly unstable:  ten measures of C-7 (the dominant?) accompany this tune in a long crescendo before finally cadencing on F, nineteen measures into the movement!  Yes Toto, we're not in Kansas (nor Op. 18) anymore.  After a hiatus of six years, Beethoven is now a Romanticist.  This piece has what one might expect: long-breathed melodies, moments of high drama, and significantly more complex development of the thematic materials.

The transition to the expected "second theme" is longer than the norm as well; Beethoven strongly hints a move into G-major instead of C.  This music is suave; I can think of no better description.  Right when it appears as though we are about to transition back to the beginning, there is no repeat; instead the cello takes the tune in a completely different direction.  The odd progressions of piano half notes reappears before the first violin takes turn again with an almost stagnant whole note accompaniment (often tied across six bars).  We've wended our way to D-flat major, one of Beethoven's (soon-to-be) favorite kind of altered mediant relations.

Another deviation from the "norm" happens when B throws a curveball in the form of a false recapitulation.  Just as the listener (at least this one) believes that he's rescored the recap in harmony with the inner voices, it just doesn't happen!  Not for 35 bars in which the opening materials are almost inverted before the cello takes over as in the opening with the two violins slapping away with the eighth-note accompaniment.

It is not until the conclusion that we encounter the expected, and even that is not so: just as it seems as though we're going to finish as we began--in a gentle sound world fading away--three great chords concluded.

But a final word on the form.  I like to watch the "clock" in an examination of the "traditional" sonata.  Even without an expositional repeat, the recapitulation comes in almost exactly two thirds of the way through the piece.  So, even though Beethoven has apparently departed from the norm, that structure is still in his head and it just comes out so naturally.

This music is so far advanced from Op. 18 that I am reminded of Brahms or even Dvorak.  All this shares with Op. 18 no. 1 is its key of F-major.  But one is left to ask:  Is that a coincidence?  

Movement II (Allegretto vivace e sempre scherzando)

It's the scherzo in the place where the slow movement is supposed to be, something he's done before but we won't see in the symphonies until the Ninth.  Hmmm.

This movement seems to be about the pervasive rhythm (16th-16th-8th-8th) that imbues the movement, but Beethoven is always throwing back and forth between the rhythmic interplay and the dolce theme (that almost never seems to last long enough).  Back and forth, back and forth.  There is even more than a bit of the kind of off-beat hemiola that no one did better than Brahms.  Of course, we know his model.

The whole thing seems through-composed as there are no repeats at all; no real trio.  It's a hybrid at best, but among the most original I've heard to this point.  The old guy even hints at a different ending (or not) with descending pitches of G-flat (first violin), E-natural (second violin), and F (viola) before the final tonic.

Movement III (Adagio molto e mesto - attacca:)

Admittance of my ignorance:  had to look up "mesto"--not something I encounter a lot.  Means mournful or melancholy, which obviously explains B's choice of F-minor.  This is the longest movement in the quartet and, since it continues into the fourth without break, is MUCH longer than anything I've encountered.  I keep wondering:  shades of the fifth symphony?  Maybe in the attacca,  but not in the way it's set up.  In this instance, this movement acts almost as a slow introduction for the finale.

I am astounding at these sounds unlike any I've heard and such a statement in what has been a bright and airy quartet.  Beginning sotto voce, the poignant (not a strong enough term) melody is whispered by the first violin.  The cello answers expressive in a consequent phrase:  it's tearful, it's such an exclamation of grief and, to think, Beethoven may not actually have heard that much of this astounding creation.  And this even at times approaches the Beethoven of his later years, exploring almost an abandonment of traditional tonality.  I used to tell my students (probably still do) that Beethoven really isn't a great tunesmith (like Mozart, for example).  In music like this, quite frankly, he doesn't have to be.  I know of no other composer who can emit such melancholic expression from an arpeggio.

And the instrumentation!  Exploiting the expressive qualities of the cello like none before him.  Once the opening tune finally reappears (theorists--call it a rounded binary if you must), the sound world is vastly different from its inception, with a pizzicati bass line and tremulants in the inner voices.  Just when you figured it couldn't get more emotionally-fraught....the cello brings the exposed theme in the upper register.  And then he turns a canonic duet into an octave melody between the violins.  The textures continue to amaze me.  I don't want it to end, but unfortunately it must and B simply vaults into F-major and away we go with....

Movement IV (Theme russe, Allegro)

A digression upon discovering a note online.  Beethoven wrote to his publisher around this time, "I am thinking of devoting myself almost entirely to this type of composition."  Of course, he would write quartets throughout his compositional life.

My opinion (not that it's worth much)?  The opening of the finale is a let down, but then again, where could we possibly go after the preceding movement?  I guess we have to just go and dance, but of course, this Viennese "hoe-down" (my ignorant terminology) achieves high art.  It must be the Slavic nature of the tune that makes it sound almost Dvorakian in its minor key excursions.  It must be said that this frenetic music is nearly exhausting in its energetic thrust.  AND, there is certainly the use of some of the scherzo's rhythms for unification; yes, he's thinking that far ahead.

But what's this?  A sudden adagio?  Not for long.  Wham.  Bam.  And we whap our way to the conclusion...

June 26:  Op. 59, No. 2 in E-minor

Whilst whistling the day away, supping tea and devouring crumpets, one might have the inclination to analyze the sonata form of none other than L. V. Beethoven’s String Quartet in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2, Allegro Movement. In theory, tea and sonatas are a glorious match, but in personal experience, coffee tends to be a better suit. Without any further ado — the analysis.

This particular string delight is a bit indefinite in the divisions between sections aside from the Exposition (arguably mm. 2 - 70), the Development (mm. 72 – 143), and the Recapitulation (mm 144-211). A large coda closes the piece out, starting in mm. 212 and going through to the finish.

The Exposition seems to only have one tonal center rooted in the key of E minor, however there are blatant texture changes/themes found in mm. 24, mm. 34, and mm. 58. Beethoven also has the tonality flit from minor to major, and back again.

The Development elucidates upon the previously seen material from the very beginning of the Exposition, as well as the section around mm. 58. A transition can be found from mm. 133-143, bringing the listener right to the Recapitulation.

The Recapitulation does exactly what it should in that it ties everything together in a way to close the piece. Snippets from the themes in the Exposition are found (namely the beginning motif, and subsidiaries), along side material from the development that essentially is taken from the Exposition.

The start of the coda takes the listener back to the opening bars of the piece, and finally draws everything to a close as it wanes into nothing.

 Overall, Beethoven’s piece does not follow the sonata form of the Classical-era to a "tea," in that the ambiguity of the sections did not lend itself to analysis. Until we meet again, just remember that coffee and sonatas are highly recommended for all who seek thrill and excitement. Adieu.

Daniel White

Theorists....ho-hum.  And to think I used to write program notes in somewhat this kind of fashion, explaining the form but really saying little about what was behind the notes (as Mahler might say) or discuss the emotional impact this music might have on the listener.  While such things can be highly subjective, that's what blogging is for and the reader should take such things at face value.

Movement I (Allegro)

Grand gesture and rhythmic interplay.  That's what the movement is all about.  Beethoven is becoming more advanced in his technique, particularly in the uses of textures and this quartet often uses the entire ensemble in virtuosic unison rhythms following B's contrapuntal forays.

The crashing opening chords reappear many times, but seem to have even more power when expressed in softer dynamic ranges.  B also uses this I-V progression to launch into new keys, often far afield from where we're expecting.

The coda is a long one, developing the ideas even more before leading to what seems to be a big finish (as would seem so from the "big" opening).  Instead he chooses to end in nearly complete silence...

Movement II (Molto Adagio: Si tratta questo pezzo con molto di sentimento), loosely translated as "lots of feeling"

As he has done do many times before, B delays the tonic chord until the 8th bar, offering an initial feeling of unrest.  Will this pervade the movement?  A seemingly silly little staccato figure appears in the first violin but the tune appears in the lushness of each of the lower voices, if ever so briefly.  And how this guy makes a triplet major scale sound like high art!  But the darkness intrudes with a kind of drumbeat in the viola and cello--but it refuses to remain in the shadows.

The triplets are merely a precursor for the texture which will lead us to angst and forboding.   And with no warning whatsoever, the recap returns, this time (of course) with the rhythms of accumulated accompaniments.  The sneak....the beauty....the rapture.  The second violin is singing above the rest?  That accompanying figure sounds faintly like hunting horns, but this is a pastoral of the most serene, as we are all suspended in mid air...

I am beginning to find B's codas particularly moving and poignant, not a tailpiece but a vital part of the whole, seeming to explore new territory before--this time--leading to those scales (offered by all).  Again, as in the first quartet of the set, this is the weightiest and longest movement of the work, lasting nearly three minutes longer than the first.    

Movement III (Allegretto)

A minuet?  Hmm.  With all the rhythmic displacement, it's hard to get a handle.  We're in 3/4 but B makes it sound as if it were 6/8.  This is no simple minuet, nor even a scherzo....are we heading towards the waltz?

The fun definitely begins in the "maggiore" section, flitting about in triplets, with the occurrence of the "commissioned" theme russe.  But then the whole thing--minor and major repeats--followed once again by the original minor.  These are the kinds of formulaic changes we'll experience in the (much) later symphonies.  But again, within the quartets lie Beethoven's compositional workshop.

Movement IV (Finale - Presto)

What kind of dance is this?  The horses are certainly galloping along at a frenetic pace.  It's almost a Turkish rondo, but not.  But is it a rondo?  Not like one I've heard...A sonata rondo, then.  By this time--well past the "Pathetique" Sonata, it can be expected.  But the sound world...I'll never get over the profundity of these when compared with what now seem the juvenile Op. 18 quartets.  And just when it seems like a major key conclusion, we're violently tossed back to the minor.  Amazing.

July 14:  Op. 59, No. 3 in C-major

I've gotten dreadfully behind in my Beethoven excursion thanks(?) to a lengthy set of Independence Day rehearsal and concert commitments.

Movement I (Andante con moto - Allegro vivace)

The String Quartet in C Major, Op. 59, No. 3 has acquired the nickname Eroica because of its glorious, triumphant finale. Initially, it was the most well received of the three quartets and probably remains the most frequently performed. It is one of the most radiant works Beethoven ever composed. Its beginning is as noteworthy as its ending, no doubt one of several places in which the Razumovsky quartets confounded its first listeners. Like Mozart’s Dissonance quartet (also in C major), a work that Beethoven greatly admired, it begins in obscurity: a brooding series of diminished chords whose destination grows ever more obscure as the outer voices, treble and bass, progressively diverge in a wedge shape. Any sense of motion fairly disintegrates.   Kai Christiansen, Earsense Chamberbase

As Mr. Christiansen states, the introduction to this quartet is truly baffling.  Opening on a diminished seventh chord, its very difficult to note where B is headed.  The cello, for its own part descends in a scalelike manner for the first 29 bars, ascending only when the downward motion extends beyond the C-string (and then leaping up to B-natural).  From a theoretical standpoint, the best of us would be confounded to attempt to analyze this music, as the only "cadence point" of any kind is the hurried eighth-note C-major chord at the opening of the Allegro vivace itself.  But then again we're led from G to A (or is it d-minor?), to C7 (!) to G7 (a dominant?) and FINALLY to C-major in the 43rd bar of the piece.  Talk about delayed expectations!

But, as expected, the darkness of the opening gives way to bright sunshine as the tonic burst forth with heady ensemble rhythms over a thumping eighth-note cello.  B is again exploring his contrapuntal side throughout, with some straightforward stretti as well as counterpoint in duet forms. A few of the transitions, interestingly enough (like the final cadences into measure 43), seem more than a bit awkward given Beethoven's harmonic gifts.  Still his use of sforzandi (on weak beats) in the close of the exposition further propel us forward.

The harmonic structure of the middle portion was established at the onset and we visit keys far and wide.  As usual, just as B seems to have settled somewhere (like E-flat major), we're off again to A-minor--or are we?  The harmonic rhythm as well as the overall propulsion slow to a snails pace in a lengthy diminuendo, in which there is yet another slightly awkward (to my ears anyway) transition to the expected recapitulation.  Actually, because of what has come before us, there is little surprise left in store as B has used up so many of his tonal resources.  We are left with a rather hurried coda, not at all as interesting as some of the rest, but satisfying in that there is (at long last) a fortissimo V-I cadence.

Movement II (Andante con moto quasi Allegretto)

Odd.  The tempo rather belies that of a "slow" movement.  The key is A-minor.  The cello spends the bulk of the movement playing pizzicato.  The form seems to almost be through composed until a well-hidden recap.

Despite the tempo, there is continuous movement in an undulating 6/8 time.  The first two phrase units are repeated, again a departure from the "norm" and following a clear cadence, we're off into a netherworld of harmony and clashing dissonance, suggesting those quartets far in the future.  But a brief, sweet little tune in C emerges, clearing our ears of all this noise; of course, though, not for long.  My mind is confused, my theoretical brain even more so...

There are mysteries within this music that demand closer attention and more hearings...someday.

Movement III (Menuetto. Grazioso.)

Hmm.  A minuet and not a scherzo?  Again, it's an oddity.

This movement almost seems to harken back to a more innocent time as it is basically a straightforward minuet and trio--with a twist (of course):  an immediate attacca into the final movement.

Movement IV (Allegro molto)

Starting with a lengthy fugue subject:  viola, violin 2, cello, violin, this movement flies at such a brisk pace that it is nearly impossible to keep up with the score.  I find that I can nary turn pages quickly enough.

The motion never ceases until a (long last) fermata sets the players and listener up for a kind of double fugue, although the themes (the brisk opening with a rather slower moving chromatic) merely hand the materials off to another voice rather than continuing in counterpoint.  Beethoven continues his developmental ideas through to the end, sending us far afield from C-major, but it's the chromatic theme that seems to propel the music forward.

Eroica?  Not like anything I know in the third symphony.  This whole quartet bears repeated listenings if only to be able to capture at least a few more of the master's ideas.

All three of the Razumovsky quartets are conceived on larger scale that even the most noteworthy of their predecessors from any composer. Beethoven’s genius enabled him to do this while, at the same time, strengthening a sense of unity across the greater expanse. Op. 59, No. 1 is famous as the first quartet to omit the repeat of exposition: a false start immediately diverts into an enormous development section with the paradoxical effect of tightening the entire movement into a single gesture. Two of the quartets fuse their last movements together without a break in the music, a further technique of joining separate parts into a larger, unified whole. There are symmetries separated by vast distances such as the beginning and end of the third quartet. It can be argued that there are even specific harmonic relationships between the end of one quartet and the beginning of the next. Many have suggested that Beethoven conceived of the three separate Razumovsky quartets as a unified whole. The vast first movement of Op. 59, No. 1 is not fully balanced until one reaches its magnificent counterpart in the finale of Op. 59, No. 3. Perhaps the three quartets function like a gigantic three movement work with a broad and complex first movement in F major, a tense contrasting movement in e minor, and a bright, exultant finale in C major. A performance of the complete set in a single concert gives this very impression. With the proper preparation for its context within this larger setting, the third quartet acquires a further triumphal radiance. The distinguished scholar Leonard Ratner suggests that all of Beethoven’s quartets may even form a kind of mega-work, a single great narrative that stands apart from all other music in history.  Kai Christiansen, Earsense Chamberbase

These guys were something in their day....they still are...