Goldner String Quartet

Friday, 25 May at 8pm

Dene Olding (violin), Dimity Hall (violin), Irina Morozova (viola), Julian Smiles ('cello)

"a group of the highest international class"
The Guardian, London, 2011

"quartet-playing of the rarest quality"
The Guardian, London, 2011

"This is a very fine quartet indeed"
The Telegraph, London, 2011

"the delicacy of the Goldner’s playing"
The Telegraph, London, 2011

"the Goldner Quartet...Their ineffably serene performance of Beethoven's Heiliger Dankgesang from the Quartet Opus 132 will be long remembered by those who heard it"
Sydney Morning Herald, August 2010

"the Goldner musicians excel in their ensemble interplay"
Ben Hogwood, Classical

"the Goldner String Quartet’s ensemble is well-nigh faultless"
Ben Hogwood, Classical

"elegantly sophisticated"
BBC Music Magazine

"They were absolutely intent, and demanded a similar level of concentration from the audience, scarcely pausing for breath as they made sense of this majestic, almost gothic construct that is Op 131.  It is always impressive to hear a good quartet play this work live.  With the Goldners, at least for me, it was also enlightening."
Sydney Morning Herald, 2004

"The Goldner String Quartet gave a performance that can only really be described as immaculate, crafting the circumspect lines of the opening movement with a wonderful sense of space"
Sydney Morning Herald, 2004

"Their sheer power was what immediately impressed, particularly as it was combined with the control needed to drive this veritable juggernaut (Beethoven Op 133) of a movement round some very sharp corners.  But beyond the shock and awe, there was a thrilling sense of dialogue as the quartet negotiated their way through the notes"
Sydney Morning Herald, 2004

Programme

MOZART – String quartet in D, K 575, First Prussian

BEETHOVEN – String quartet in D, op 18, no 3

INTERVAL

DVOŘĮK – String quartet in F, op 96, American

About the Artists

Named after the founder of Musica Viva Australia, this quartet comprises two married couples.  Although all are members of the Australia Ensemble resident at the University of New South Wales, the Goldner String Quartet is an independent entity. This immaculate group is in high demand both locally and internationally.

Dene Olding is Concertmaster of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Programme Notes

MOZART – String quartet in D, K 575, First Prussian

Allegretto / Andante / Menuetto: Allegretto / Allegretto

Although the three string quartets, K 575, K 589 and K 590 were said to have been dedicated to the King Friedrich Wilhelm of Prussia, who was a keen amateur 'cellist, the first edition appears not to have borne any dedication at all. However, the king certainly played them. In any case, it seems that the royal virtuosity had to be taken into account – in almost every movement, the 'cello has the predominant part.

As Alfred Einstein puts it, "These are three works that emerged under the most dreadful spiritual oppression, and yet they rise to heights of pure felicity". This is especially true of the first of the group.

In some ways, the "First Prussian Quartet", K 575, dated Vienna, June 1789 – around the time Cosģ fan tutte (K 588) was being composed – is a bridge between the old and the new. The quartet opens with the older-style singing allegro theme which, as Hanz Rutz writes, is “at once given greater animation by appoggiaturas and rapid quavers, and above all by the energetic triplets of the concluding motif”. The tranquil second movement, with its important development section, recalls the theme of the song, Das Veilchen, which Mozart wrote five years earlier. According to Charles Suttoni, the minuet, which is characterized by string sforzati, "hovers between traditional dance music and the fanciful scherzos of later composers", while in the trio section a lyrical melody is entrusted to the ‘cello. The Finale, a rondo movement in which the main theme is again played by the ‘cello, becomes, as Suttoni says, "in effect, an eighteenth-century anticipation of the nineteenth-century cyclic principle of returning themes".

BEETHOVEN – String quartet in D, op 18, no 3

Allegro / Andante con moto / Allegro / Presto

Although Beethoven expressed some of his most advanced and original thoughts and refined musical invention in his string quartets, he appears to have approached the genre with some apprehension. He wrote a short minuet for string quartet (op 3, published in 1796), a string quintet (op 4, 1795), a string trio-serenade (op 8, 1796) and a set of three wonderful string trios (op 9, 1797-1798), before he settled down to compose his first set of string quartets in 1789. These op 18 quartets were dedicated to Prince Franz Lobkowitz, who commissioned them. They were completed and published in 1801, in two sets of three, at a time when Beethoven had no other major works in hand except, at the end, his septet, op 20.

Although the rather gentle D major quartet, op 18, no 3, was the first-written, it was placed third in the first set – perhaps because the one called op 18, no 1 seemed a more forceful introductory work. The quartet starts with an allegro movement but, as Robert Simpson observes, "the first two notes of the violin and their continuation in quietly flowing quavers over a very deliberate chordal accompaniment could easily be the start of a slow movement. We realise only after a while that the motion belongs to an allegro". There are, according to Philip Radcliffe, "many delightful features in this movement: the unexpected modulation at the beginning of the second subject, the beautifully contrived return to the main theme after the development [. . .] and the short but eventful coda".

The andante movement is in rondo form and based on a twelve-bar theme that is opened by the second violin and taken over and repeated by the first violin before the theme has been completed. The central section is devoted to the development of the main theme. In the coda, animated passages in triplets alternate with interesting new developments of the theme.

Beethoven labels the third movement, in 34 time, allegro, rather than menuetto or scherzo.  It is what Joseph Kerman calls "a spotlessly groomed little piece whose one interest seems to be in making itself inconspicuous". Its short accompanying trio section, in D minor, in which the upper voices decorate a four-note descending bass, and the return to the allegro is not via the usual da capo signal but, instead, the main part of the movement is re-written with some amplification of colour.

When the light, high-spirited, presto finale arrives, the quartet becomes a little less 'gentle'.  Indeed, as Robert Simpson says, the "sustained brilliance in this quartet is reserved for the finale, in a fast six-eight time". The movement eventually concludes with a rapid retreat from the fortissimo activity followed by four pianissimo recalls of its first three notes.

DVOŘĮK – String quartet in F, op 96, American

Allegro ma non troppo / Lento / Molto vivace / Finale: Vivace ma non troppo

While in the United States, Dvořįk encountered American folk music in the form of Native-American drumming and African-American spirituals.  He regarded the latter as profoundly original music that might serve as a basis for a national style.

The American quartet dates from the period when Dvořįk was Director of the National Conservatory of Music in New York.  The composer spent the summer of 1893, surrounded by his children who had journeyed across the ocean to be with him, at the home of his secretary and her family in the Czech colony at Spillville, Iowa.  It was during this sojourn that he wrote his symphony "from the New World", his string quintet (op 97) and the so-called "American" quartet.  Apparently, the sketch for the quartet was completed in three, rather long days and the score was completed within two weeks.

The quartet opens with a theme modelled on the beginning of Smetana's E minor quartet, and the whole first movement seems to reflect the Afro-American folk music of the time  The mood of the lento, the crown of the work, suggests the composer's nostalgia for his homeland.  This movement grows out of a beautiful melody that the ‘cello takes over from the first violin.  The main theme of the scherzo is based on the rapid, incessant song of a red bird with black wings, which Dvořįk noted down during a stroll through the woods.  The vivacious finale is in rondo form.  It is in the opening and closing movements that you will hear folk-like music, melodies that probably justify the name of the quartet.