Chamber Mendelssohn Haydn

Joseph Haydn’s (1732-1809) importance to music history can hardly be overestimated: through more than 100 symphonies and almost 70 string quartets he made a tremendous contribution to defining these forms, and has been called both “father of the symphony” and “father of the string quartet”. In addition, he was a significant source of inspiration to and friend of Mozart, as well as being Beethoven’s teacher. He spent most of his career writing music for the Hungarian noble family Esterhazy, at their castle.

Haydn had a habit of composing his string quartets in collections of six, and the last of these was commissioned by a Hungarian count in the 1790s, and is believed to have been completed in 1797. The fourth in the series, Quartet in B-major, has been given the title “Sunrise” due to the rising main theme introduced by the first violin in the first movement. The second movement continues to build on a fragment of this principal theme. There is a touch of Balkan inspiration in the mid-section of the third movement, which might be a salute to the Hungarian count to which Haydn dedicated the work. Both this quartet and the quartet series as a whole is considered a masterpiece within its genre.