The Jerusalem Quartet ranks among the world’s most renowned chamber ensembles and has been shining on international stages for more than twenty years.

Joseph Haydn
String Quartet in B-flat major, Op. 76 No. 4, Hob. III:78 “Sunrise”

Leoš Janáček
String Quartet No. 1 (Inspired by Leo Tolstoy’s The Kreutzer Sonata), JW VII/8

Maurice Ravel
String Quartet in F major, Op. 35

Jerusalem Quartet:
Alexander Pavlovsky – violin
Sergei Bresler – violin
Alexander Gordon – viola
Kyril Zlotnikov – cello

In this concert, the ensemble will perform the String Quartet in B-flat major, the fourth of the six quartets of Op. 76 by Joseph Haydn, composed in 1797–1798 for the Hungarian Count Joseph Georg von Erdődy. The quartet earned the nickname “Sunrise” thanks to its magical, dreamlike introduction, in which the violin melody gradually emerges above the sustained chords of the other instruments.

Intense and passionate emotions burst forth from Leoš Janáček’s String Quartet inspired by Leo Tolstoy’s The Kreutzer Sonata, composed in 1923. The central figure of Tolstoy’s novella is a woman terrorised by her despotic and pathologically jealous husband, who ultimately torments her to death. “I had in mind a poor woman, tormented, beaten, battered to death,” Janáček described the main idea of his work. The composition received enthusiastic acclaim at its premiere in 1924 and has since secured its place as one of the leading works of the string quartet repertoire.

Although Maurice Ravel dedicated his String Quartet in F major (1903) “to my dear teacher Gabriel Fauré,” the main inspiration for this exceptional work came from the impressionistic palette of Ravel’s friend Claude Debussy. It is Ravel’s only composition for string quartet and one of his earliest masterpieces, which brought him his first major success on the musical stage. Ravel’s music dazzles with imaginative handling of instrumental colours and captivates with exotic elements inspired by the music of the Far East.