String Quartet No. 2, Op.17 (Sz. 67) (parts) by Bela Bartok
Urtext edition by Lazlo Somfai and Zsambor Nemeth. Published by Henle
Bela Bartok (1881-1945) was one of Hungary's greatest composers and one of the most outstanding composers of the 20th century. He was a committed modernist, applying the contrapuntal rigor of Bach and Brahms to the broader tonal sensibilities of Debussy and Schoenberg. He was also one of the first ethnomusicologists; he recorded folk music across Eastern Europe with fellow composer Zoltan Kodaly, later incorporating folk song into his own music. He wrote much in the way for strings, including string quartets, concertos, and folk suites.
Bartok's six string quartets form one of the most fascinating and unique cycles of the quartet literature. His String Quartet No. 2, Op.17 (Sz. 67), completed in 1917, is indebted to his work collecting folk music and represents an early blossoming of his assured, individual modernist style. Its three-movement structure follows an unusual slow-fast-slow pattern; the first movement works out motives in passages of drama and tranquility. The raucous, wild second movement contains aspects of North African and Hungarian music. The finale movement is an eerie movement of chilling stasis. Kodaly would later remark that it is a quartet of "life episodes." This Henle urtext edition is based on Bartok's corrected print of the 1940s and contains historical and critical commentary. Parts only. Master level, Grade 6.
