Beethoven: "Razumovsky" Quartets, Op. 59

The three string quartets of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Op. 59 were composed in 1806 and dedicated to Count Razumovsky, the Russian Ambassador in Vienna. These quartets are Beethoven’s first from his “middle period,” in which he expanded the length and complexity of the genre, just as he had done already with the Eroica Symphony (No. 3, 1803–04) and “Waldstein” Piano Sonata (Op. 53, 1803–04). Quartets Nos. 1 and 2 each incorporate a Russian folk tune, while No. 3 has a slow movement that sounds vaguely East European.

Introduction

The three quartets form a kind of triptych, not only because of their Russian connections but also because of their use of keys. No.1 is in F major, while No. 2 is in E minor; but its opening phrase in E minor is immediately repeated in F major, recalling the previous quartet. The finale of No. 2 begins in C major, anticipating the key of No. 3, and only gradually gives way to the main key of E minor. The first chord of No. 3, if performed immediately after No. 2, sounds as if it is still in E minor, but the music then works its way through a series of unstable chords until finally settling in C major for the main, Allegro section of the movement. 

Performers and listeners initially found the three quartets, especially the first, extremely challenging, with only No. 3 slightly more conventional and approachable. But gradually the three works came to be revered as among the greatest in the string quartet genre, and they have held this place ever since.

History

1806 was a particularly productive year for Beethoven. As well as composing the “Razumovsky” Quartets, he completed his Fourth Piano Concerto, revised almost every movement in his recent opera Leonore (or Fidelio, 1804–05), wrote the whole of his Fourth Symphony and his 32 Variations in C minor (WoO 80), and finished the year by composing his Violin Concerto, Op. 61, which was performed on December 23rd. The three quartets were probably commissioned by Count Andreas Razumovsky (1752–1836), but there is no document confirming this. Razumovsky was himself a keen violinist and, for a time, supported a resident string quartet led by Ignaz Schuppanzigh.

Beethoven may have begun sketching Op. 59 as early as 1804, but the main work took place during the spring, summer, and fall of 1806. Numerous sketches survive for all three quartets, though, unusually, they are not found in an integral sketchbook but on groups of loose leaves. The autograph of No. 1 bears the inscription “begun on 26 May 1806,” and it appears that the first two movements of the autograph score of No. 2 were also ready by late October. Beethoven was still sketching the remaining movements at that time, but they were finished shortly afterwards, and a trial performance of all three took place, privately, early in 1807. The set was finally published in January 1808 by the Kunst- und Industrie-Comptoir in Vienna and bore a dedication to Count Razumovsky, although at one point Beethoven had planned to substitute the name of Prince Karl Lichnowsky.

Beethoven: Quartet in C major for Strings, Op. 59, No. 3 (“Razumovsky”)

Beethoven took the two Russian tunes from a collection of Russian folksongs published in 1790 by Ivan Prach and Nikolai Lvov. An expanded edition appeared in 1806, but Beethoven probably used the original publication, which includes both tunes. The tune for “Akh! talan li moi, talan takoi” (“Ah, whether it’s my luck, such luck”) was used in the finale of No. 1, while “Uzh kak slava Tebe Bozhe” (“Just as there is glory to thee, God in heaven”) appears in the third movement of No. 2, and was later used by Modest Mussorgsky in his opera Boris Godunov (1868–72). The idea of using folksongs in a multimovement chamber work may well have been derived from Ignaz Pleyel, who had incorporated Scottish folk tunes in six piano trios published in Britain during 1793–94 and reprinted within about a year by several leading continental publishers, thus becoming widely known by 1800. Like Pleyel, Beethoven used the purely musical elements of the tunes, completely disregarding the sense of the words (even if he understood them, which is doubtful).

Form

All three quartets follow the four-movement pattern established by Joseph Haydn in his string quartets and taken up in Beethoven’s earlier set of quartets, Op. 18 (1798–1800). Each has two fast outer movements, but the two middle movements show more variety of form. In No. 1, the slow movement comes third and is preceded by a scherzando (“playful”) movement. In No. 2, the very slow second movement (“Molto adagio”)—which, according to Beethoven’s pupil Carl Czerny, was conceived by Beethoven when contemplating a starry sky—is followed by a mazurka-like Allegretto, in which the Trio section is dominated by the aforementioned Russian folksong. And in No. 3, the Russian or Polish character of the not-so-slow second movement is followed by a graceful minuet in traditional 18th-century style.

Analysis

No. 1 opens with the theme in the cello beneath accompanying instruments—a highly unusual texture, but one already exploited by Beethoven in the main opening themes of both his Second and Third Symphonies. More significantly, however, the theme is in the same register, and played by the same instrument, as the Russian tune that opens the finale, thus providing a subtle hint of what is to come. Another remarkable feature of the opening theme is its slow harmonic pace: the harmony does not change until bar 7, and the second chord, though getting gradually louder and more widely spaced, does not resolve until bar 19. Using only two chords in 18 bars is a means of signalling that the movement will be of unprecedented length, even though there are no internal repeats. (Beethoven wrote one for the second part of the movement in the autograph score but then deleted it.) 

Unusually, all four movements are in sonata form, and the scherzando that comes second is positively hilarious (and was greatly amusing to the first performers). The main theme begins with the absurd idea of a single note played 15 times by the cello unaccompanied, but its distinctive rhythmic pattern enables Beethoven to find ways of developing it in the rest of the movement. Though in sonata form in terms of themes, the keys seem all wrong, for after starting in B-flat major, the secondary key area is F minor instead of F major, the reprise of the opening theme appears in the remote key of G-flat major before returning to the home key, and the F-minor secondary theme reappears in B-flat minor. Beethoven seems to be poking fun at the usual pattern, and sudden loud or soft chords add to the humor. The third movement is a complete contrast: deadly serious and tragic in character, it is marked “mesto”—an instruction to play sadly or mournfully throughout. The mood dissipates only at the very end, as florid runs of notes lead to a lengthy trill that accompanies the start of the Russian theme dominating the finale.

The second quartet opens with two solid chords, followed by a whole-bar rest that functions as part of the motif and reappears several times during the movement—Beethoven’s silences are sometimes as important as the notes. The main theme that follows then paraphrases a minor-key version of the Russian tune from the third movement. Thus, as in No. 1, there is a hint of the folksong to come—a very different procedure from Pleyel’s, in which the folksongs appeared without any preliminary preparation. The first movement is not quite as long and difficult as in No. 1, but it does include a repeat of the exposition. Beethoven instructs the performers to play the slow, contemplative second movement with “molto di sentimento” (“much feeling”). It is in E major, as is the trio section of the third movement. Thus, as in all Beethoven’s other works in the key of E, all the movements in this quartet are in E major or E minor. In the third movement, the Russian theme is treated as the basis for a fugato (quasi-fugue), in which each of the instruments in turn plays it against a countermelody. The finale is essentially in sonata rondo form; and as the main theme begins solidly in C major, this key keeps returning, not being fully overcome by E minor until the coda.

The ambiguity of key in the finale of No. 2 is retained in the slow introduction of No. 3, which, after hinting at the key of No. 2, progresses through a series of strange, chromatic chords in which the cello gradually descends to its lowest note (C). The chromaticism of this passage may recall the opening of Mozart’s “Dissonance” Quartet (K. 465, 1785), which is in the same key; but at the ensuing “Allegro vivace,” the key of C major is quickly established. The second movement is in A minor, and its gentle 6/8 melody is accompanied by a prominent cello part played pizzicato (plucked). Though sounding plausibly Russian, attempts to relate it to any particular Russian folksong have been unconvincing. The graceful minuet that follows leads to a livelier trio section, and a return of the minuet leads to a coda that eventually pauses on an unstable chord (known as a dominant seventh) before launching into the extremely fast finale without a break. The finale starts out as a fugue, led by the viola and followed by the other instruments in turn, but the movement proves to be in sonata form; and at the recapitulation, the fugal theme returns, accompanied by longer notes on the other instruments, leading eventually to a false ending and a couple of pauses, before the energy levels return for the final coda.

Critical Thoughts

Like the Eroica Symphony and the “Waldstein” Sonata, these quartets did not merely break new ground, being longer and more complex than previous quartets; they transformed the entire genre, raising it to new levels of sophistication, technical challenge, and profundity of thought, which have persisted ever since in the leading examples of the genre. 

Legacy

The new levels of complexity in these quartets inevitably took a little while to be appreciated. When they were first heard in Vienna in early 1807, a review in the Leipzig Allgemeine musikalische Zeitung described them as “very long and difficult” and not easy to comprehend, with the possible exception of No. 3. Felix Radicati, an Italian musician, simply described them as “not music” when he caught sight of them during a visit to Manchester in 1811. When the Scottish publisher George Thomson tried out No. 1 repeatedly with some friends near Edinburgh in 1813, the performers became more enthusiastic with each attempt, and he expressed particular delight in the “immortal” theme of the Adagio: he wrote to Beethoven, “It would comfort me even when dying.”  But he complained about the difficulty of the music, claiming that there were not a dozen people in Scotland who could play them, and not one who could play correctly the first-violin part of all three. Even Ignaz Schuppanzigh, the original first-violinist, complained about a particularly tricky passage, and reported that Beethoven just responded: “Do you believe I think about a wretched fiddle when the spirit is speaking to me?” Nevertheless, the quartets were soon reprinted in several countries and quickly became a staple part of the quartet repertoire—a position they have held ever since. Their technical difficulties remain a challenge, and even today, any ensemble that can tackle them successfully deserves much admiration.

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Article by Barry Cooper