Bartok: The String Quartets

If I had to point to a single work or set of works that has had the most impact on me as a composer/guitarist/artist in general/human, it is without question the Bela Bartok string quartets.  There are six in the cycle, and they were composed between 1909 and 1939.  

There is a persistent rumor among Bartok scholars that there is a seventh quartet, though the whereabouts of the score are unknown.  In the 1973 book Bartók, written by Lajos Lesznai, Mr. Lesznai states: "In the last year or so of his life, he made some sketches hypothesized to be the slow movement of a never completed seventh quartet."  In the early 2000s, I spoke with Peter Bartok (Bela Bartok's son) about this, and he denied the existence of either a score or sketches for a seventh quartet.

Recommended reading for further reference and background:

• String Quartet No. 1 Op. 7, Sz. 40, BB 52

• String Quartet No. 2 Op. 17, Sz. 67, BB 75

• String Quartet No. 3 Sz. 85, BB 93

• String Quartet No. 4 Sz. 91, BB 95

• String Quartet No. 5 Sz. 102, BB 110

• String Quartet No. 6 Sz. 114, BB 119

I have owned a copy of the complete scores since 1987, and have analyzed and
copied from and read them and still do.  Right now, that score is sitting on the CD shelves in the studio where it's always available.  I am still being taught things through these quartets.
I am not trying to pass myself off as an expert here; just relaying my thoughts and experiences with these pieces. 

I must have at least a half-dozen recordings of the Bartok cycle.  I have yet to find a single recording that I think works for each quartet.  The ones to which I listen the most are, in no particular order:

• Emerson
• Takacs
• Belcea
• Alban Berg
• Juilliard (1981 recording); 2nd choice is Juilliard's 1963 cycle

In my opinion, the Bartok quartets could be the most complex 20th-century string quartets, with the possible exception of Elliott Carter's.  
Side note: my favorite recording of Carter's are by the Juilliard Quartet from 1990/91; he supervised the sessions and the performances are staggeringly great.  

For Bartok, I really think you need at least any three of the recordings I listed to begin to get the full breadth and grasp of those pieces.  These quartets demand a completely visceral performance with no reservations.  I hear some performances where the tempos are right, but it sounds like the quartet is afraid to commit, or is being too delicate, or is tip-toeing around the score, or is afraid or incapable of meeting the demands of these works.  Those performances just fall flat and entirely fail to capture anything.

Hence, some of the best recordings will be really great for some of the quartets, but miss the mark on the others.  That's part of why you need more than one recording.   The 4th quartet is a great metric; one example is the opening 14 bars, and the final two bars are where many quartets just can't make it happen.

The other piece of that equation is that the quartets are so complex that you're going to hear different score details from recording to recording.  Even the way the microphones were set up for the recording sessions can determine how much of the nooks and crannies of the score you're going to hear.  I can hear details in recording X that are lost in recording Z.

If I had to select just one, it would probably be the 1988 Deutsche Grammophon recording of the Emerson String Quartet.  It's not the best, as there is no best for Bartok quartets, but I think they may get the closest in performance on most of the quartets, even though I hear more details in other recordings and I hear other recordings that are more loyal to the score in places.  

The odd/sad thing is this.  In 1995, I went to a Tanglewood concert in Ozawa Hall of the Emerson quartet performing the entire set of Bartok quartets in one night.  It was a long concert with a long intermission.  This was without question the best/favorite concert I've ever attended.  Their recording of the Bartok quartets dates from 1988.  As I said, it's a fine performance for the most part.  It seems that in the seven years between those recording sessions and the concert in 1995, they did a lot of thinking about this and clearly a lot of rehearsing.  I bought their Bartok set as soon as it was released; it was one of my first CDs.  By the time I saw them in '95, I pretty much had that recording memorized, and if CDs wore out like vinyl, I would have gone thru several copies because I played it all the time.  Anyway, at the '95 performance they just blew me away.  It was as if they went over the 1988 recording with a microscope, found all the places that were lacking, and just nailed those sections.  When I saw them, it was stunning.  That was the only performance of which I know that did indeed get, in my opinion, just about a perfect performance and interpretation.  If there was a recording of that night, that would be the single performance/recording to have.  It's frustrating because I believe it was recorded.   Ozawa Hall has a set of Neumann mics permanently installed and suspended over the stage.  Ozawa Hall is an amazing place.  It's a concert hall, but it was designed to also function as a recording studio, so the acoustics in it are well beyond amazing.  I've looked over the years, but have never found an available recording of that performance.  It was just stunning and I've yet to hear a recording of that level from anyone else.

And most times I hear the Bartok quartets, I will hear something new in them that I'd not previously heard.

Side note: I can only listen to the Bartok quartets in winter.  Last winter I went on a recording comparison rampage and must have listened to these quartets if not every day, then several times per week all winter.  

I'm looking forward to this winter so that I can resume the research.  And learning.

-kk