String Quartet No. 4 in E minor, B. 19 - Antonín Dvořák

String Quartet No. 4 in E minor, B. 19 by Antonín Dvořák

Dvořák completed this quartet in 1870. At the time, Dvořák was sharing rent on a small flat in Prague with five other people. The meagre income Dvořák received from his work as a performer would need to be supplemented from teaching piano.

It is in 1870 that Dvořák would also complete his first opera ‘Alfred’. As with many of the works of this period it did not have a performance until much later, with some other compositions not being performed until after the composer’s death in 1904.

It is also in 1870 that Dvořák would complete his string quartet No. 4. It was the third of three quartets begun in 1869 which the composer would later attempt to destroy due to an immense feeling of self-criticism. Fortunately, the works were recovered from separate copies. The work would have a public premiere in 1932.

This quartet is comprised of three movements:
I. Assai con moto ed energico 00:00
II. Andante religoso 14:25
III. Allegro con brio 24:26