Bartók's Fourth String Quartet - 4 (Forms & Key Relationships)

Hoday,

The Fourth String Quartet composed by Belá Bartók, pays homage to the sonata form yet reveals a side of original thinking by uniting new methods of form versus theme, sound versus math, and new theory versus tradition.

Quartet No. 4 contains five movements of which the first and fifth are related by allegro and allegro molto. The second prestissimo con sordino and the fourth, allegro pizzicato, with the third movement, Non troppo lento standing alone at its keystone of the arch form.

The key relationship is also of the same symmetry in that the first and last movements are in the key of C, while the second is a major third higher in E, and the fourth a major third lower in A-flat. Also the central movement is in itself an A-B-A form. The entire piece is set for thematic development. The sonata-form movement begins with a rising half-tone and acts as a seed for future growth. Many of the beginning themes are not recognizable until the middle and end of the movements. The development and growth of the piece in fact makes sense out of complex mathematical process.

(I have attached the first page of each movement)

Before going into the many processes of the piece you may want to download it from iTunes under Belá Bartók.







later.

Bartók's Fourth String Quartet - 2

Hoday,

The first analyst is the author of six books regarding Belá Bartók. Elliott Antokoletz studied violin at The Julliard School of Music and received his Ph.D in Musicology at The City University of New York in 1975. As a member of the Queens College Faculty String Quartet, Antokoletz has also been professor of musicology at The University of Texas at Austin since 1976. He is also the editor of the world renowned International Journal of Musicology and received the Belá Bartók Memorial Plaque and Diploma from the Hungarian Government in 1981. Antokoletz' writings are some of the most recent and comprehensive in respect to translations and corrections beside periodicals and journals. In addition, they offer a non-biased point of view that has separated time and generation from Belá Bartók's passing through today.

The next analyst has neither an index nor a biography in his book entitled Belá Bartók, by Erno Lendvai. Lendvai divulges precise theories and provides accurate portrayals of tonal principals, axis systems, diatonic systems, golden section and the Fibonacci Series, chromatic systems, and the use of intervals that are inherent to Belá Bartók.

Halsey Stevens wrote on of the most honest evaluations about Belá Bartók in 1953. Stevens was not a degreed musicologist or biographer but offers the viewpoint of the composer. His strengths lie in his presentation of point of view and his summarizations to support the evidence. His personal relationship with Belá Bartók leads to first hand knowledge that no other writer at this point in history can claim. For one example he writes, "Others used the term bitonality to explain Belá Bartók music knowing that Bartók himself frowned upon such interpretations."(1) Steven's third edition book took ten years of a Bartók scholarship and takes advantage to correct past errors, reconsider translations, and re-examine works previously unknown in past editions. His education is documented as a student at Syracuse University and at The University of California at Berkeley. Stevens was a student of Ernst Bloch and taught at The University of Southern California until his death in 1989.(2)

The last section of sources will be taken from journal articles and program notes of two recordings. The first recording is by The Chilingirian quartet from 1995 and a second recording from The Julliard String Quartet from 1968. The liner notes from the Julliard recording include intimate details of the piece from the performer's points of view and can be compared to the other theorists in this report. James Goodfriend, editor of the Julliard recording liner notes writes, "The Bartók String Quartets, both individually and together, are such works of art. One can not learn from them what the man, Belá Bartók, looked like but they convey, with startling immediacy, the personality of the man who was Belá Bartók." (3)

(Just a note that all sources and footnotes will be revealed at the end of this series due to internet attribute constraints).

Stay tuned...

Bartók's Fourth String Quartet

Hoday,

Every period of music has produced important advances in theory to analyze. But perhaps one of the most important periods of music to analyze came from the nineteenth century.
And certainly breaking down the thought process of certain composers such as Belá Bártók has become one of the most revered in the study of music composition.

Instead of analyzing this piece to the countless identical conclusions of many theorists and musicologists, this study will attempt to analyze a comparitive point of view of theorists in regards to the fourth string quartet. It will also contain compoarisons to his preceding three and post two string quartets.

Later...