The Fourth String Quartet by American composer Elliott Carter was composed in 1985–86 in New York City and Rome, and completed in June 1986.[1] It was premiered on September 17, 1986, at Festival Miami, University of Miami, Florida by the Composers String Quartet.[2]
In contrast to the collage forms employed by Carter in the 1970s, the Fourth Quartet (similar to the nearly contemporaneous Triple Duo and Penthode) begins with an opposition of instrumental forces and then moves toward a rhapsodically accelerating finale that draws these opposed instruments into a continuous melodic line.[3] The quartet can be heard as "an intensifying dispute, accompanied by a rising sense of intoxication".[4] Each instrument has its own repertory of pitch intervals and its own structural speed. A polyrhythm of 12:126:175:98 governs the structure of the entire composition, usually resulting in rhythmic relations of 8:6:5:7 (the cello plays septuplets nearly all the time).[5]
Typical running time - 24'
