Beethoven harp quartet

Beethoven op 59 no 1
Beethoven op 59 no 2
Beethoven op 59 no 3 analysis

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String Quartet No. 8 (Beethoven)

String Quartet
Ludwig van Beethoven, 1803 portrait
Key	E minor
Opus	59, No. 2
Published	1808
Movements	Four

The String Quartet No. 8 in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2, was written by Ludwig van Beethoven and published in 1808. This work is the second of three of his "Rasumovsky" cycle of string quartets, and is a product of his "middle" period.^[1]

Music

It is in four movements:

Allegro, ⁶
₈, E minor
Molto adagio (Si tratta questo pezzo con molto di sentimento), , E major
Allegretto (with the second section marked "Maggiore – Thème russe"), ³
₄, E minor – E major – E minor
Finale. Presto, , C major – E minor

Apart from the Piano Sonata No. 27 opus 90, this is the only piece by Beethoven in the key of e minor.

According to Carl Czerny, the second movement of the quartet occurred to Beethoven as he contemplated the starry sky and thought of the music of the spheres (Thayer, Life of Beethoven); it has a hymnlike quality reminiscent of a much later devotion, the Heiliger Dankges

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String Quartet No. 9 "Rasumowsky-Quartett" #3

Ludwig van Beethoven's String Quartet No. 9 in C major was published in 1808 as opus 59, no. 3. It consists of four movements:

Andante con moto - Allegro vivace (C major)
Andante con moto quasi Allegretto (A minor)
Menuetto (Grazioso) (C major)
Allegro molto (C major)

This work is the last of three quartets commissioned by prince Andreas Razumovsky, then the Russian ambassador to Vienna.

References and further reading

External links

v • d • e String quartets by Ludwig van Beethoven
Opus 18
Opus 59 (Rasumovsky)
Other middle period quartets
Late quartets
String quartet arrangement of Op. 14, No. 1 by Beethoven

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String Quartets, Op. 59 (Beethoven)
Set of three string quartets commissioned by Andreas Razumovsky
The three Razumovsky (or Rasumovsky) string quartets, opus 59, are a set of string quartets by Ludwig van Beethoven. He wrote them in 1806, as a result of a commission by the Russian ambassador in Vienna, Count Andreas Razumovsky:
They are the first three of what are usually known as the "Middle Period" string quartets, or simply the "Middle Quartets." The other two are opus 74 and opus 95. Many quartets record all five as a set.
Beethoven uses a characteristically Russian theme in the first two quartets in honour of the prince who gave him the commission:
In Op. 59 No. 1, the "Thème russe" (as the score is marked) is the principal theme of the last movement.
In Op. 59 No. 2, the Thème russe is in the B section of the third movement. This theme is based on a Russian folk song which was also utilised by Modest Mussorgsky in the coronation scene of his opera Boris Godunov, by Pyotr Tchaikovsky in the introduction to act III of his opera Mazeppa, by Sergei Rachman