Australian String Quartet

Friday, 20 March at 8pm

Formerly the ‘Tankstream’, founded in 1985, the Australian String Quartet is Quartet-in-Residence at the Elder Conservatorium of Music at the University of Adelaide

Sophie Rowell (violin), Anne Horton (violin), Sally Boud (viola),
Rachel Johnston (‘cello)

Programme

HAYDN - Quartet in G major, op 77, no 1
MOZART - Quartet in G major, K 80
SCHUBERT - Quartet in G major, D 887

About the artists

The Australian String Quartet is based at the Elder School of Music at the University of Adelaide. Until 2006, its current members were known as the Tankstream Quartet, based in Sydney. The players are renowned as an ensemble having a distinctive musical approach, demonstrated by their success in international competitions and prominence onthe concert stage. They have had lessons with members of the Amadeus, Smetana, Hagen, Bartok, Kodály and Alban Berg Quartets. In 2001, as the Tankstream Quartet, they won the 2nd Melbourne National Chamber Music Competition and, in 2002, the 4th Osaka International Chamber Competition String Quartet Division. In 2005, again as the Tankstream Quartet, they came second in the First Borciani Quartet Competition, in Italy, and won the Eighth International String Quartet Competition in Cremona.

Programme Notes

Compiled by Martin Cooper

HAYDN - Quartet in G major, op 77, no 1, H III:81

Allegro moderato / Adagio / Menuatto: Presto /Finale: Presto

Haydn's two op 77 string quartets of 1799 were commissioned by the composer's patron, Joseph Franz Maximillian Lobkowitz, first Duke of Rundnice and, indeed, are known as the Lobkowitz Quartets.

The first movement of the G major quartet is based on a march. This is followed by a slow movement in E flat, written in a free sonata form. The menuetto is back in the key of G, and sits across trio in E flat. The finale, however, is the movement that really emphasizes the influence of gypsy-style music on Haydn, who shows here what can be done in a dazzling and contrapuntal way with a simple gypsy tune.

HJ Robbins Landon considers that this quartet "sums up [. . .] Haydn's [. . .] love for folk music and his brilliantly successful attempt to wed it to the great tradition of Western music".

MOZART - Quartet in G major, K 80

Adagio / Allegro / Menuatto / Rondeau

The fourteen-year-old Mozart wrote the first three movements of his first string quartet at Lodi, when he and his father were on their way back from Milan to Modena. These movements reflect the influence on the young Wolfgang of the music of composer Giovanni Sammartini and his group in Milan. The final movement was added a couple of years later, explaining the change of style. All four movements are written in G major.

SCHUBERT - Quartet in G major, D 887

Allegro molto mderato / Andanteun poco messo / Scherzo: allegro vivace – Trio: Allegretto / Allegro assai

Schubert's late quartet was written in ten days although he had spent much time planning it in his mind. It was not performed publicly until 1850 – he died in 1828 – and was published in 1851 as op posth 161.

The first movement, which Hans Keller describes as being "by any standards one of Schubert's finest", is based primarily on the contrasts of tone colour and expression created by major and minor tonalities. The second movement opens with a serenely beautiful 'cello melody. The short, swift, scherzo of the third movement is contrasted by the embedded allegretto trio section. The concluding allegro assai, constructed in rondo form, again has a theme swaying between major and minor keys.