Obscure Music Monday: Zemlinsky's String Quartet no. 1 in A major

Alexander von Zemlinsky (Oct. 14, 1871 - March 15, 1942) was born in Vienna, Austria, and played the piano from a young age. Admitted to the Vienna Conservatory in 1884, and won the school's piano prize in 1890. He began writing in1892, when he started studying theory with Robert Fuchs, and composition with Johann Nepomuk Fuchs and Anton Bruckner.

There are many prominent composers that had significant parts in his development and recognition as a composer. Zemlinsky had a fan in Johannes Brahms, and so much so that Brahms recommended the N. Simrock company to publish Zemlinsky's Clarinet Trio. Gustav Mahler helped push Zemlinsky's reputation as a composer when he conducted his opera Es war einmal. To add another major composer to the list, Schoenberg was a student of Zemlinsky! Despite all this and more, Zemlinsky, sadly, is not a mainstay in the classical repertoire.

Today we are looking at just one of his excellent (and underplayed) works, his String Quartet no. 1 in A major.

The first movement, marked Allegro con fuoco starts off a little sigh and then dives right in to joyful motifs, filled with harmonies reminiscent of Brahms, and syncopated rhythms that give it much excitement.

The second movment, Allegretto, has a typical three part form of a scherzo. The two outer sections are more relaxed and melodic than the middle section, which is more agitated and frenzied.