Leoš Janáček, a great Czech composer, wrote his most original and profound music in the last decade of his life, up to his death at 74.
Composer's Artistic Vision
Unlike Tolstoy's novella, which tells the story from the husband's perspective, Janáček's String Quartet No. 1 explicitly takes the wife's part, ending with a defiant assertion of her individuality.
Composition History
Janáček composed his String Quartet No. 1 in just over two weeks in the autumn of 1923, partly by adapting movements from an earlier, lost piano trio.
Composer's Artistic Vision
Janáček considered his String Quartet No. 2, 'Intimate Letters', to be his "first composition which sprang from directly experienced feeling."
Composition History
Janáček dedicated his String Quartet No. 2, 'Intimate Letters', to Kamila Stösslová, a much younger woman with whom he had a passionate, one-sided love affair.
Composition History
Janáček's String Quartet No. 1, titled 'Kreutzer Sonata', reflects his love for Russian literature and is based on Leo Tolstoy's 1889 novella of the same name.
Composer Biography
Bohuslav Martinů, a younger Czech compatriot of Janáček, spent much of his life abroad in Paris, the USA, and southern Europe, unlike Janáček who rarely left Czechoslovakia.
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Gade: String Quartet No. 1 in D Major, Op. 63 & String Quartet in F Minor
