String Quartet
SKU:
BR.SON-634
Composed
by Jean Sibelius. Edited
by Tuija Wicklund Pekka
Helasvuo. Chamber music;
Linen. Complete Works.
Late-romantic; Early
modern. Complete Works.
328 pages. Breitkopf and
Haertel #SON 634.
Published by Breitkopf
and Haertel (BR.SON-634).
ISBN 9790004803691. 9
x 12
inches.
Sibelius's
oeuvre contains four
string quartets. They
appeared over a long time
span and in different
phases of his
professional career. Most
of his early compositions
were chamber music, and
he composed his three
earliest quartets (in E
flat major (JS 184,
1885), A minor (JS 183,
1889), B flat major (Op.
4, 1890)) around his
study years. They
remained unprinted during
his lifetime, and the
string quartet in E flat
major was also not
performed in public. The
quartet in D minor Voces
intimae op. 56, on the
other hand, was completed
in London in the spring
of 1909, and Sibelius
wrote to his wife Aino:
It became wonderful. Just
the kind that raises a
smile on one's face even
at the moment of death.
Voces intimae was
published in the same
year. Even later,
Sibelius seemed to be
very satisfied with his
composition, for he wrote
in his diary: It is
generally claimed to be
my best work. I do not
think quite that, but it
does belong among my best
ones..