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performance is not allowed. Please be sure that all

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Concerts are made possible in part through the generosity of donors

to the National Gallery ofArt through The Circle. Reserved seating is

available in recognition oftheir support. Please contact the development 

office at (202) 842-6450 or circle@nga.gov for more information.

The Seventy-Third Season of

The William Nelson Cromwell and F. Lammot Belin

Concerts

National Gallery ofArt

3,048th Concert

National Gallery ofArt String Quartet

Claudia Chudacoff and Teri Lazar, violins

Osman Kivrak, viola

Marion Baker, cello

April 19, 2015

Sunday, 3:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court
Program

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791)

String Quartet no. 1 in G Major, K. 80 (1773)

Adagio 

Allegro 

Menuetto; trio

Rondo

Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975)

String Quartet no. 7 in F-sharp Minor, op. 108 (i960)

Allegretto

Lento

Allegro; allegretto; adagio

Maurice Ravel (1875-1937)

String Quartet in F Major (1903)

Allegro moderato

Assez vif, tres rhythme

Tres lent

Vif et agite
The Performers

The National Gallery ofArt String Quartet has performed regularly at the

Gallery since its debut in 1995. In addition to standard quartet repertoire, the

group presents rarely heard masterpieces of chamber music. The musicians

also perform under the name Sunrise Quartet, and in that capacity they

have been recognized with a Chamber Music America residency at the Duke

Ellington School ofthe Arts as well as with residencies at Concerts at the Beach

in Delaware and the Davies Concert Series in Camp Springs, Maryland. The

quartet appeared on the Millennium Stage at the John F. Kennedy Center for 

the Performing Arts and has collaborated in concerts at the National Gallery 

with pianists Miceal O’Rourke and Menahem Pressler.

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Program Notes

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart wrote his String Quartet no. 1 at the age offourteen during his first tour of Italy. The work is also known as Mozart’s Lodi

Quartet, since he completed the work in one sitting in a tavern in Lodi,

Lombardy—Mozart’s father, Leopold, made a specific annotation in the

manuscript to that effect. Mozart conceived the quartet in three movements

after the style ofthe Italian trio sonata. He continued to revisit the work at 

various points over the next decade and added a French rondeau to the three

Italian dance movements. Eventually, he deemed the work worthy to copy for 

a patron in Paris, which allowed for wider dissemination and appreciation.

Although it is Mozart’s first venture in the quartet genre, the composition has the same self-assured grace of his mature style. The opening adagio

is sincere and subtle, steady in tempo but with a varied palette of articulations throughout. The second allegro movement provides an impetuous contrast, demanding a mixture offlashy dexterity and sensitive lyricism from the

players. The third movement is a standard minuet and trio, and the allegro

finale recalls the character ofthe second movement and complements the

rest ofthe work, despite being composed two years later. In rondo form, the

finale features a refrain marked by high, suspended pauses and low, brisk

resolutions indicative of Mozart’s musical wit.

Dmitri Shostakovich experienced heightened musical freedom following 

Joseph Stalin’s death in 1953, and addressed heavy subject matter in his

seventh and eighth string quartets. He dedicated these works to both his late 

first wife, Nina Varzar, who had died oflung cancer six years earlier, and “to

the victims offascism and war,” the latter during a visit to the Dresden. The

seventh quartet marked a stark departure from Shostakovich’s prior modus

operandi within the quartet genre. He had framed his first six quartets’ tonalities 

around a progression of descending thirds: C—A—F— D— B-flat—G. The

next in line would be E-flat, but Shostakovich instead resumed this pattern

with his String Quartet no. 9 in E-flat Major. Typically associated with joy and

human heroism, E-flat major would not have meshed with the seventh

quartet’s somber subject matter, so the composer turned to F-sharp minor

for his key.

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The first movement, essentially in sonata form without the development

section, introduces a common Shostakovich motive ofthree repeated eighth

notes. This movement’s middle section, set in E-flat major, ventures fleetingly 

to the quartet’s would-be key before returning to a pizzicato-based recapitulation in F-sharp minor. The still and elegaic quality ofthe second movement owes to Shostakovich’s sparse textural choices: he occasionally writes

duet sections for instrumental pairs rather than integrating all four players

throughout the work. The third movement, a wild and variedjugato, alludes

often to themes from earlier movements. Also present is the common

“D-S-C-H” motive, although here out ofsequence as “S-D-C-H.” The “D-S-CH” motive, containing the notes D, E-flat, C, and B-natural, was Shostakovich’s signature, a way ofwriting his own German initials into his music.

Maurice Ravel submitted his String Quartet in F Major to the Prix de 

Rome and the Conservatoire de Paris competitions, and both institutions dismissed the work following its 1904 premiere. Ravel dedicated the work to his

mentor, Gabriel Faure (1845-1924), who called the quartet’s finale “stunted,

badly balanced, in fact a failure.” Although wide criticism ofthe quartet caused

Ravel ultimately to leave the Paris conservatory in frustration, many members

ofthe French musical community adored the work, with Claude Debussy (1862-

1918) among its staunchest supporters. The work’s controversy helped bring

attention to Ravel, which advanced his career.

Debussy and Ravel wrote one string quartet each, and these works are often 

paired together and compared. Debussy’s 1893 quartet may have presented

him as a progressive, but he was still searching for his mature voice. Ravel’s

1903 quartet, on the other hand, is a mature, well-crafted work. Some

defining features ofit include the second movement’s rhythmic pyrotecnics

in the second movement scherzo, as well as the finale’s radical transformation of prior themes in the finale.

Program Notes by Michael Jacko, Music Program Assistant, National Gallery ofArt

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Upcoming Concerts at the National Gallery ofArt

Timo Andres and David Kaplan, pianists

with the National Gallery ofArt Vocal Ensemble

Music by Andres, Brahms,

and Schumann

April 26, 2015

Sunday, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court

“Pershing’s Own” United States Army Band

Music by Sousa

and other composers

May 3, 2015

Sunday, 3:30 pm

West Building, Mall Steps

Pavel Gintov and Mykola Suk, duo pianists

Music by Mozart, Bach,

and sons

May 10, 2015

Sunday, 6:30 pm

West Building, West Garden Court