Title: Quartet No. 4 in C Major, Opus 61
Description: The music in this work differs fundamentally from Dvorak's previous string quartet with its subtitle "Slavonic". In his new quartet the composer did not use a single melody that might have been described as "Slavonic"; for his inspiration he looked to the likes of Beethoven and Schubert. With its absence of Slavic undertones, the Quartet in C major is fairly atypical for Dvorak. Nevertheless, it is a testimony of the next stage in his development and is undeniably one of Dvorak's finest chamber pieces. The quartet betrays a Classical sense of equilibrium and great intellectual depth, clearly profiled thematic material and a high level of formal compactness in all four movements. The first movement in sonata form is surprising for its resourceful development of the main subject, the latter's various transformations, and the remarkable harmonies overall. The second movement, with its dialogic development of the chief motif and the impulsively chromatic passages, is truly a gem among Dvorak's adagios. The Beethoven model is most tangible in the third, scherzo movement, particularly in the brusque rhythms of its main section. The work culminates in the fourth movement, whose sense of boisterous joy appears to subside before the close, only to end brazenly in a short, rousing coda. - antonin-dvorak.cz