Grieg: String Quartet No. 1 in G minor

String Quartet No. 1 in G minor is the first of two string quartets by the Norwegian composer Edvard Grieg (1843–1907). (The second remains incomplete.) The quartet was composed in 1877–78, when Grieg had already achieved international recognition, albeit primarily as a master of small forms. Although still a relative rarity in the concert hall, the piece is widely considered one of his most successful and ambitious extended works.

Introduction

A notable feature of the work is its deployment of the opening melody from Grieg’s song Spillemaend (“Minstrels”) as a unifying theme. Spillemaend is the first of the Sex digte af Henrik Ibsen (“Six Poems by Henrik Ibsen”), Op. 25, composed in 1876, and the Norwegian text at the opening translates as follows: “My thoughts are with her every bright summer night.” In various transformations, this melody appears in three of the four movements as a recurring theme, in the tradition of cyclic composition associated especially with Franz Liszt, and later with César Franck. The musical themes of the quartet are accordingly marked by an unusually high degree of integration.

History

Grieg composed the work during an extended stay in the Hardanger district of Norway. This was then (and still is today) the home of a singular tradition of folk music associated with the Hardanger fiddle—an instrument whose evocative, haunting sound is created by sympathetic strings that resonate under the bowed strings. Some features of the Hardanger fiddle’s traditional repertoire are present in this quartet, especially in the second and third movements. Grieg’s stay in Hardanger proved a welcome escape from strenuous professional obligations in Christiania (Oslo), and it undoubtedly encouraged a renewal of his creative energies, and a newfound seriousness of purpose. The composer himself observed that the quartet was “not intended to bring trivialities to the market.”

The work was well received at its first performance in Cologne, Germany, in October 1878. However, Grieg’s preferred publisher, C. F. Peters, initially rejected it on the grounds that its musical material was not well suited to the medium. The eventual reversal of this opinion may well have been due to the ringing endorsement of the work by Liszt, who remarked that it was “a long time since I have encountered a new composition, especially a string quartet, which has intrigued me as greatly as this distinctive and admirable work by Grieg.” It was published in 1879—first by E. W. Fritzsch, then by Peters.

Grieg: Quartet in G minor for Strings, Op. 27

Form

The first movement adheres to an orthodox sonata-form design in three parts—exposition, development, recapitulation—and it maintains the conventional key relationships associated with the form. Thus, the second theme, which is based on the song melody, is in the relative major key (B-flat major) in the exposition and the home key (G minor) in the recapitulation. There is a slow introduction and an extended coda, both invoking the theme from Spillemaend. The second movement, “Romanze,” alternates a pastoral melody in the major key with impassioned episodes in the minor—a scheme perhaps inspired by Frédéric Chopin, who was much admired by Grieg (and who used a similar structure in his Nocturne, Op. 15 No. 1, and Second Ballade, Op. 38.) The third movement, “Intermezzo,” is really a scherzo and trio—a fast, lighthearted section followed by only three instruments playing in each measure—with the trio folk-like in character. The finale is a kind of rondo—a series of contrasting sections—whose spirited principal theme is marked "Presto al Saltarello," referencing a popular Italian folk dance. As in the first movement, the song melody frames the finale, appearing in both the slow introduction and the coda.

Analysis

Although the form of the quartet is conventional, the musical material imbues the form with distinctive qualities. The work is characteristic of the late Romantic era in its relatively self-contained, strongly characterized themes, whose juxtaposition can tend towards episodic construction. Thus, following the slow introduction, the first and second themes of the first movement are respectively passionate and tender in character, and are clearly separated in time with no attempt at transition. The development section also speaks of its era by distinguishing between two rather different approaches to thematic manipulation. One involves fragmentation of the theme—breaking it down into motives (short series of notes) in the manner of Classical development sections—while the other presents the theme more or less intact, but with different characters and settings. This latter technique is associated especially with Franz Liszt.

The juxtaposition of contrasting elements is also characteristic of the second movement, which is best understood as a dialogue between the pastoral melody and the impassioned episodes, with the two worlds abruptly colliding in the later stages of the movement. The last two movements align more with Classical precedents: both the trio sections of scherzos and the rondo finales often had a folk-like, “popular” character in Viennese Classicism. The song theme comes to the fore in these two movements, furnishing the main theme of the Intermezzo as well as the slow introduction and coda of the finale.

Critical Thoughts

The initial criticism by the publisher C. F. Peters, echoed by several later commentators, speaks to a wider question about the quartet medium in the late 19th century. For composers in the Classical era, the quartet was an intimate conversation—notionally of equals—and thus involved the sharing of musical material between the four instruments. But by the time Grieg came to write this quartet, the genre had already taken on much of the public character associated with the symphony, and it often aspired to the massive sonorities associated with the genre. This may be why composers such as Johannes Brahms turned to chamber genres involving five instruments, or even six.

It has often been suggested that Grieg was more at ease composing songs and piano miniatures than longer chamber and orchestral works. (His gifts as a lyricist were widely recognized during his lifetime, and his harmonic palette, often inspired by nature, came to be regarded as an important precursor to Impressionism in music.) The First String Quartet provides ample corroboration of his acumen in composing music on a larger scale. However, Grieg has on occasion been considered “great in small things, but small in great ones”—to borrow one critic’s verdict on Chopin. This may be a criticism of the composer for failing to achieve what was never in his sights. And one rejoinder to the charge that Grieg’s extended works (such as the quartet) are too episodic in structure is to argue that it is all right for such works to be episodic.

Legacy

Liszt’s admiration for Grieg’s quartet was no doubt encouraged by its cyclic form, its picturesque evocations of nature and folklore, and its bold, even radical approach to harmony. These qualities were also appreciated by progressive composers in France, where Grieg’s music was highly valued. Maurice Ravel famously declared that, aside from Claude Debussy, there was “no other composer to whom I feel more related than E. Grieg.” More specifically, ever since the musicologist Gerald Abraham made the connection in 1948, critics have commonly considered Grieg’s quartet an important influence on Debussy’s String Quartet, composed a decade later and likewise a cyclic composition in G minor. The case can easily be overstated (the string quartet by Franck might also stake a claim), but it is a compelling argument nonetheless.

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Article by Jim Samson