This is the Study Score edition of Per Nørgård's String Quartet No.8 'Night Descending'. Programme note: This piece is based on 5 sections from my chamber opera Nuit des homme where a string quartet is the leading instrumental ensemble. Even though the subject is The Great War (1st World War) the plot is on a psychological level and follows the development of a couple - in poems of Guillaume Apollinaire. The couple's war enthusiasm in the beginning is replaced by horror and in the end dehumanizing. The five movements of the quartet express phases in this process: from the Eulogy of the prologue praise of the The Sun of Gold above the humananimal - a rhythmic tense and still more and more militaristic movement - to The Journey whose enlargement of conscience due to the exhausting tempo of the new era is suddenly stopped in the fourth movement carrying the title of the piece and expressing the calm before storm not as a blessing of peace but as a latent anxiety. In the epilogue of the fifth movement the theme of the prologue reappears but it is changed from hymn to elegy. The quartet is dedicated to the Zapolsky Quartet who took part in the world premiere of the opera in September 1996. Per Nørgård 1997

An informative preface and critical commentary by Ales Brezina and Ivan Straus (Cz / Ger / Engl / Fr) - A new practical edition at the forefront of Martinu scholarship - All existing sources consulted.The String Quartet no. 6 by Bohuslav Martinu (1890-1959) represents a distinct step on the journey which the composer characterised as his development from geometry to fantasy and for which the almost continuous use of the principle of developing variations restless harmonic development the pulsation of minute rhythmic values and inventive work with sound are characteristic.The quartet which was written in New York in the autumn of 1946 constitutes the beginning of the composer's later works in which moods freely overflow regardless of any predefined formal layout. The editors of the new edition (based on the composer's autograph) have carefully removed all of the problematic and somewhat arbitrary editorial intervention in the sole existing edition dating from 1950 (actually 1955).With its urtext edition of the 6th quartet Editio Bareneriter Praha has continued in its series of new publications of works by Bohuslav Martinu - quartets nos. 4 and 5 have already been published for this instrumental line-up.

Berkeley's second string quartet uses a free random presentation of thematic material. There is a sharp contrast between the tight and rhythmic central section and the final passage which dispenses with barlines altogether providing a fascinating journey through interrelated and continuous sections.

Appony Quartets-Joseph Haydn composed the string quartets known as Op.71/74 also called the 'Apponyi' Quartets in 1793. The composer dated the autograph scores accordingly although the year that appears on those of the B flat major and D majorquartets shows signs of having been corrected. These two works might already have been finished in 1792. However it is certain that Op.71/74 were composed in Vienna during the period between Haydn's two journeys to England andintended as a series of six quartets.The decision to divide the quartets into two sets of three was taken by the publishers. The three Quartets Op.71 were first published in 1795 by Corri Dussek & Co. then in a slightlyrevised reprint by the Viennese publishing house of Artaria & Co.