String Quartet No. 1 (Tchaikovsky)

Structure#

The quartet has four movements:

II. Andante cantabile#

The melancholic second movement, which has become famous in its own right, was based on a folk song the composer heard at his sister Aleksandra her family, the Davydov’s house at Kamenka in Ukraina whistled by a house painter. When the quartet was performed at a tribute concert for Leo Tolstoy in 1876, the author was said to have been brought to tears by this movement: “…Tolstoy, sitting next to me and listening to the Andante of my First Quartet, burst into tears". When the Zoellner Quartet, at her request, performed the second movement for Helen Keller, who rested her fingertips on a resonant tabletop to sense the vibrations, she, too, reacted strongly. She quickly sensed the musical vibrations, swaying in time, alternately crying and smiling. Afterward, Keller reacted as follows: The melody from second theme of the Andante cantabile, in D major, was used as the basis for the popular song “On the Isle of May”, popularized by Connee Boswell in 1940. This movement ends with plagal cadence.

External links#

• Performance of String Quartet No. 1 by the Borromeo String Quartet from the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in MP3 format
• Tchaikovsky Research