At the centre of Bartók's œuvre are his string quartets, which are generally acknowledged as some of the most significant pieces of 20th century chamber music. This book examines these remarkable works from a range of theoretical and methodological perspectives.

"Béla Bartók's string quartets are 'key works': in them is reflected the stylistic development not only of his own art but of the music of a whole age, the twentieth century, and also of the string quartet genre itself. Each of the six string quartets represents a milestone in Bartók's creative path. They offer a faithful and comprehensive picture of the various periods in the composer's creative development, each bears the characteristic marks of these periods, showing as they do the direction taken by Bartók's orientations, the various influences and his own individual original methods. János Kárpáti's monograph on the one hand sets these works against the background of the whole history of the string quartet as a genre, thus indicating their position as the direct continuation of the late Beethoven quartets, and on the other hand it presents an exposition of the factors involved in Bartók's art, the trace of the influence of art music and folk music, of predecessors and contemporaries--placing Bartók at the head of the twentieth century masters as the distillation and summary of all that preceded him."--Dust jacket.

(Boosey & Hawkes Scores/Books). HPS 77

At first sight a work devoted to Bartók's chamber music looks as though it were simply concerned with a genre division attempting an exposition of no more than a single aspect of the whole oeuvre. But in Bartók's case the chamber music is not simply a matter of grouping according to genre-it is really the framework for his whole oeuvre. (From the introduction) "János Kárpáti one of the outstanding scholars in the field of Bartók research here presents a revised and expanded edition of his Bartók's String Quartets (Corvina Press 1975)."

The author tells of his own development as a student, "of how he and his intrepid colleagues were converted to chamber music ... [and of how] four individualists master and then overcome the confining demands of ensemble playing."--Jacket.

Spotlighting the four women of the Lafayette Quartet, a leading Canadian ensemble, Rounds offers both a comprehensive history of the beloved instrumental form and an inside view of the complex world of professional quartet players, revealing the exultation and heatache that are the performing artists' daily fare. A treat for every music lover, whether player, listener or composer.

This book presents a theory of metrical conflict and applies it to the music of Schumann, thereby placing the composer's distinctive metrical style in full focus. It describes the various categories of metrical conflict that characterize Schumann's work, investigates how states of conflict are introduced and then manipulated and resolved in his compositions, and studies the interaction of such metrical conflict with form, pitch structure, and text. Throughout the text, Krebs intersperses his own theoretical assertions with Schumannesque dialogues between Florestan and Eusebius, who comment on the theory at hand while also discussing and illustrating relevant aspects of "their" metrical practices.