The Piano Quartet and Quintet: Style, Structure, and Scoring - Hardcover

Smallman, Basil

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0198163746 ISBN 13: 9780198163749

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1994

Synopsis

Designed as a companion volume to the author's acclaimed earlier study, The Piano Trio, this book surveys the development of the piano quartet and quintet from their beginnings in the mid-eighteenth century to the present day. Developments during the first four decades of the nineteenth century resulted not only in Schubert's renowned Trout Quintet, but also in works of much brilliance by Dussek, Hummel, Weber, and others in which the piano predominates in a concerto-like role. Subsequently, Schumann's epoch-making quintet of 1842 initiated a broadly "symphonic" style, with large-scale structures and closely integrated textures, which was taken up by many later composers, including Brahms, Dvorak, Cesar Franck, Faure, and Elgar. The author also examines the numerous changes in the nature of the genres which have occurred in recent times, and gives special consideration to a number of works by leading twentieth-century composers, in which "mixed" media are formed by combining wind instruments with the normal strings-and-piano ensembles.

About this title

About the Author:

Basil Smallman is Emeritus Professor of Music at the University of Liverpool.

Review:

"Another substantial and elegantly written survey....The author's deep familiarity with the repretoire is apparent throughout, and his accessible style renders the book suitable for a broad range of readers."--Choice

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0198163746
• ISBN 13: 9780198163749
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 208