Schubert – “String Quartet in E Major, Op. post. 125 Nr. 1, D-87
(November 1813 ?)- Amadeus String Quartet
Franz Schubert: String quartet D.87 in E flat major
I. Allegro moderato 0:00
II. Scherzo. Prestissimo 6:15
III. Adagio 12:00
IV. Allegro 13:40
Amadeus String Quartet (Norbert Brainin – Siegmund Nissel – Peter Schidlof – Martin Lovett)
Studio recording, London, 23-24.V.195
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Franz Schubert (31 January 1797 – 19 November 1828) was an Austrian composer. He was an extremely prolific composer, so that when he died at age thirty-one he had composed over six hundred secular vocal works (mainly Lieder), seven complete symphonies, sacred music, operas, incidental music and a large body of chamber and piano music.
Otto Erich Deutsch, an Austrian musicologist, listed 998 compositions in the first comprehensive catalogue of Schubert’s works. This catalogue was first published in 1951 as Schubert: Thematic Catalogue of all his Works in Chronological Order. A revised edition appeared in German in 1978. Later editions of the catalogue contained minor updates.
Publication of Schubert’s compositions started during his lifetime, by opus number. After the composer’s death, posthumous opus numbers continued to be assigned to new publications of his work until 1867 (Op. Post. 173).
There are two attempts to publish everything Schubert has composed in a single edition:
- From 1884 to 1897 Breitkopf & Härtel published twenty-two series of Franz Schubert’s Werke: Kritisch durchgesehene Gesammtausgabe, known as the “Alte Gesamt-Ausgabe” (AGA, the former complete edition). From 1965 Dover Publications started to reprint this edition, and later it was made available at the IMSLP website.
- The Neue Schubert-Ausgabe (NSA), also known as the New Schubert Edition (NSE), is published by Bärenreiter (Kassel). It proposes eighty-three volumes, in eight series. Publication of all volumes has been scheduled to conclude in 2016. Plans for this edition began as early as 1963, with the foundation of the International Schubert Society, headquartered at the University of Tübingen, Germany.
Texts of Schubert’s vocal music can be published without the music, for instance his Lieder (songs) at LiederNet
The following constitutes a complete listing of Schubert’s known works. It is ordered ascendingly according to Deutsch numbers, and attempts to reflect the most current information with regards to Schubert’s catalogue. For reasons of space, this list is divided into two articles. The first article lists Schubert’s compositions from Deutsch entries D 1 – D 500 (all are dated works). The second article lists Schubert’s compositions from Deutsch entries D 501 – D 965B (also dated works), as well as D 966 – D 998 (undated works). The second article also includes the Appendix (Anhang) to the Deutsch catalogue (works listed as “D Anh.”) and a list of works that have yet to receive a Deutsch number (listed as “D deest”). For the second article, see List of compositions by Franz Schubert (D 501–D 998).
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Amadeus Quartet
| Amadeus Quartet | |
|---|---|
left to right: Martin Lovett, Norbert Brainin, Siegmund Nissel, Peter Schidlof
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| Background information | |
| Also known as | Brainin Quartet |
| Years active | 1947–1987 |
| Past members |
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The Amadeus Quartet was a world famous string quartet founded in 1947 and disbanded in 1987, remarkable for having retained its founding members throughout its long history.
Because of their Jewish origin, the violinists Norbert Brainin (12 March 1923 – 10 April 2005), Siegmund Nissel (3 January 1922 – 21 May 2008) and the viola player Peter Schidlof (9 July 1922 – 16 August 1987) (later violist) were driven out of Vienna after Hitler’s Anschluss of 1938. Brainin and Schidlof met in a British internment camp on the Isle of Man; many Jewish refugees had the misfortune of being confined by the British as “enemy aliens” upon seeking refuge in the UK. Brainin was released after a few months, but Schidlof remained in the camp, where he met Nissel. Finally Schidlof and Nissel were released, and the three of them were able to study with violin teacher Max Rostal, who taught them free of charge. It was through Rostal that they met cellist Martin Lovett, and in 1947 they formed the Brainin Quartet, which was renamed the Amadeus Quartet in 1948.
The group gave its first performance as the Amadeus Quartet at the Wigmore Hall in London on 10 January 1948, underwritten by British composer and conductor Imogen Holst.[1] On 25 January 1983 the Quartet gave a 35th anniversary concert in the same concert hall with a programme which included Beethoven’s String Quartet in C major, op.59 no. 3 (3rd Rasumovsky Quartet). Touring extensively, the Amadeus performed throughout Europe, Canada, the United States, Japan, and South America. Noted for its smooth, sophisticated style, its seamless ensemble playing, and its sensitive interpretation, the quartet made some 200 recordings, among them the complete quartets of Ludwig van Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. For concerts as well as recordings of string quintets (Mozart, Franz Schubert, Johannes Brahms, Anton Bruckner) and string sextets (Brahms) they regularly invited Cecil Aronowitz as second viola and William Pleeth as second cello. Though they emphasized a standard Classical and Romantic repertory, they also performed works by such 20th-century composers as Béla Bartók and Benjamin Britten who wrote his third quartet expressly for them.
The Amadeus was one of the most celebrated quartets of the 20th century, and its members were awarded numerous honors, including:
- The Order of the British Empire, presented by the Queen.
- Doctorates from the Universities of London, York, and Caracas.
- The highest of all German awards, the Great Cross of Merit.
- The Austrian Cross of Honour for Arts and Sciences.
The quartet disbanded in 1987 upon the death of the violist Peter Schidlof, who was regarded as irreplaceable by the surviving members. Brainin died on 10 April 2005[2] and Nissel on 21 May 2008.[1] Only Lovett survived presently.
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