ST NICHOLAS’ Collegiate Church will be filled with the sound of the very first quartet for strings composed by Ludwig Van Beethoven - even if it is numbered as his third.
The ConTempo Quartet will perform Beethoven’s String Quartet in D major, Op 18, no 3 this Saturday at 7.30pm as part of the Galway Music Residency’s Experience Beethoven! concert season. There will also be an introduction by film-maker, writer, and photographer Bob Quinn, who created the film ConTempo Goes West in 2005.
The piece was written between 1798 and 1800 and published in 1801. Although numbered third, it was tyhe first quaret Beethoven wrote. It standings as one of his great acheivements, with the 20th century German-American conductor William Steinberg calling it “the gentlest, most consistently lyrical work”. Steinberg also noted how, in the fourth movement, “Beethoven first explores the idea of shifting the centre of gravity toward the end of a multi-movement work.”
ConTempo will also perform Beethoven’s String Quartet in E flat major, Op 127. In this work, which dates from 1825. Here the composer moves away from the assertive, vigorous nature of his middle period quartets, and into a new phase of intimacy and sophistication. Also notable is a further breaking away from pre-existing quartet composition conventions.
Tickets are €10/8 (adults ), €6 (students ), €25/22 (all concerts ), and are available on the door, through 091 - 586706, or [email protected].
