The Auryn Quartet, named after an amulet from Michael Ende's The Neverending Story, has been performing for nineteen years and studied with the Amadeus Quartet and the Guarneri Quartet.
Composition History
Schumann's string quartets, Op. 41, were composed in 1842, a year when he primarily focused on chamber music.
Performer Biography
The Auryn Quartet won two prestigious competitions in 1982, the ARD Competition in Munich and the International String Quartet Competition Portsmouth, just one year after its founding.
Compositional Technique
Schumann's string quartets feature a rapid succession of highly different characters, ranging from exhilaration to melancholy, and use rhythmic and metric irregularities to avoid monotony.
Composition History
Before composing his own quartets, Schumann studied the works of Beethoven and Mendelssohn, inviting Ferdinand David, leader of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, to play new quartets at his home.
Composer Biography
Robert Schumann, the composer, is often considered the epitome of the German romantic, a reputation largely built on his piano works from the 1830s.
Critical Reception
Schumann's string quartets were first published in 1843 and dedicated to Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy, initially surprising the public who were accustomed to different sounds from the composer.
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