The Piano Quartet in A minor by Gustav Mahler was written around 1876. Only the first movement survives, and it is unlikely that Mahler completed any other movements.
Contents |
This quartet is an early work of Gustav Mahler. Mahler is generally known for his large-scale symphonies and wrote no chamber music after his student years. Probably dating from 1876, Mahler wrote this when he was 15 or 16, at the end of his first year at the Vienna Conservatory. It is one of the very few works from Mahler's early youth that have survived.
The manuscript bears the stamp of the publisher Theodor Rattig; it has been theorized that Mahler sent the work to him, but he rejected it.
In several letters, Mahler mentions a quartet or quintet, but there is no clear reference to this piano quartet.
The work is scored for a usual piano quartet, which consists of a piano, a violin, a viola, and a cello. It is often referred to as Piano Quartet Movement in A minor, since the opening movement is the only one completed. Typical recordings usually last between 11 and 15 minutes.
This quartet is the only extant chamber piece known to be composed by Gustav Mahler (there was a violin sonata of similar date, apparently).[1] The work is incomplete; only the first movement was completely written.[2] However, there exists a 24-bar sketch of a scherzo written in G minor, sometimes paired with the quartet. In 1988 the Russian composer Alfred Schnittke wrote a completion of this movement; he also used the fragment in the second movement of his Concerto Grosso No. 4/Symphony No. 5.[3]
Pianist Enguerrand-Friedrich Lühl has also completed the Scherzo movement, and with an addition of two original movements not based on Mahler's materials, produced a four-movement work.
Contemporary performances:
(No other contemporary performances known)
Modern performances:
The quartet is heard in Martin Scorsese's 2010 motion picture Shutter Island and is the subject of a short discussion between the movie's characters, although the film is set in 1954, which creates an anachronism, since it wasn't publicly known until 1964. Its complete performance by the Prazak Quartet is featured on the movie's double-CD soundtrack.