Flinders Quartet

Friday, 28 February 2020 at 8pm

Thibaud Pavlovic-Hobba (Violin), Wilma Smith ( Violin), Helen Ireland (Viola), Zoe Knighton (Cello), Lloyd Van’t Hoff (Guest Clarinet)

Flinders Quartet photo credit: Pia Johnson
Lloyd Van't Hoff photo credit: Keith Saunders

“... exciting and effervescent ... had the audience sitting up in their seats paying close attention to the impeccable intonation, rhythmic unity and open communication of the four players...” Classic Melbourne, March 2019

 

Tickets for this concert can be purchased in advance

 

 

Programme

SCHUBERT String quartet no 12 in C minor, D 703, Quartettsatz

MOZART Quintet for in A for clarinet, two violins, viola and cello, K 581

INTERVAL

BEETHOVEN  String quartet no 13 in B-flat major, Op 130

About the Artists

Flinders Quartet is instantly recognisable as one of Australia’s most loved chamber music ensembles. A quartet for the twenty-first century, the ensemble approaches its third decade with acknowledged musical skill and maturity, presenting dynamic and stirring performances of a full spectrum of repertoire.

Read more about the artists

Programme Notes

In this concert the members of the Flinders Quartet commence their 20th birthday celebrations with their favourite Beethoven string quartet, the Op. 130; and continue their association with the very talented Lloyd Van’t Hoff  as guest clarinet in a performance of Mozart's exquisite clarinet quintet K 581. A birthday gift for the audience will be a performance of Schubert's enigmatic and darkly beautiful Quartettsatz.  Flinders Quartet promises to deliver these masterpieces of the string quartet repertoire in a distinctly Flinders Quartet way. 
 

SCHUBERT   String quartet no 12 in C minor, D 703, Quartettsatz 

Franz Schubert was 24 years old when in 1820 he began work on his string quartet number 12. After completing the first Allegro movement and several bars of the second slow Andante movement, he put the work aside and never returned to it. The work was given its first public performance in 1867. The score, edited by Brahms, was published in 1870. It was given the simple title of Quartettsattz meaning Quartet Movement.

While there has been much speculation about Schubert’s reason for leaving the quartet unfinished, it is recognised as a significant work. Schubert was already an accomplished composer in many forms before he began the quartet, reaching new heights in the technical virtuosity and the emotional depth of the opening movement. It is a foretaste of his remarkable later string quartets.

The movement is in Sonata form. It begins with a theme of nervous apprehension that builds in tension and drama. The mood is soothed with the emergence of a warm sweetly melodic second theme. The development section expresses darker emotions, with insistent exchanges between violin and cello. In the recapitulation section, the second theme returns and intertwines gently and easily with a new third theme. A powerful restatement of the opening theme brings the movement to an exciting close. 

                                                                                                                           C. B.  

MOZART    Quintet in A for clarinet and  two violins, viola and cello, K 581

Allegro / Larghetto / Menuetto / Allegretto con variazioni

Mozart's clarinet quintet was composed in 1789 between the first two Prussian quartets.  Even though the clarinet predominates as the first among equals, this work is in no way a concerto.  Alfred Einstein suggests that Mozart treated the clarinet as if "he were the first to discover its charm, its 'soft, sweet breath', its clear depth, its agility".  Mozart called the work "Stadler's quintet", having composed it for performance by his friend and fellow Freemason, Anton Stadler, for whom the later clarinet concerto was written as well.

The version of the quintet which is frequently heard is thought by experts to have been an arrangement for clarinet and strings of the original work which featured the basset clarinet, whose lowest note is one octave below middle C.

The development section of the first movement of the work has a concertante air about it, but for all five instruments, and the cantabile   character of the second theme is resumed in the larghetto   movement, where it is developed more fully.  The third movement contains two trios    most unusual for Mozart, except in serenades and divertimenti  the first in a minor key for string quartet alone, and the second a Ländler,  in which the clarinet becomes the rustic instrument which it was (and has remained) in South Bavaria and other alpine regions.  The finale consists of five wonderful variations on a march-theme, followed by a coda.
                                                                                                                           M.C.

 

BEETHOVEN  String Quartet no 13 in B flat major, Op 130

Programme notes for this work will be available nearer to the concert date.