Bedrich Smetana: String Quartet D minor: String Quartet: Miniature Score

From my life-In a letter of 12th April 1878 (i.e. when he had already lost his hearing) the composer declares that his design was to symbolize the course of his life in this quartet.1st Movement: Love of art in youth the unsatisfied longing for something inexpressible also a presentment of approaching mis-fortune.2nd Movement: Quasi Polka refers to a merry youth during which Smetana enjoyed dancing passionately and wrote dances with ease.3rd Movement: Largo sostenuto the felicity of his first love for the girl who later became his wife.4th Movement: Illustrates his perception of national music and the joy of success only to be suddenly broken by the extend E in the highestregister the fatal note that sounded in the composer's ear just before his deafness. Painful remembrances of the first stages of his career a fleeting ray of hope then ultimately resignation to inescapable fate.

String Quartet no. 1 in e minor-Quand Smetana en 1876 termine son Quatuor en mi mineur sous des couleurs tristes et sombres il est déjà atteint par la surdité. Quel musicien ne connaît pas ce passage fatidique du 4e mouvement où Smetana symbolise par une note ultra-aiguë au violon le début de sa maladie? Les mouvements précédents sont consacrés aux stations plus heureuses de sa vie- la préface de notre édition cite un passage détaillé d?une lettre consacré à ce sujet. Smetana qui à l?époque avait reçu de son éditeur des honoraires ridicules pour son quatuor ne pouvait pas prévoir que cette oeuvre compterait un jour au rang des quatuors à cordes les plus célèbres.?