SELECTED WORKS: with Type = 'Quartets'
Quartets
String Quartet No. 1 in d minor (1937)
String Quartet No. 1 is a thickly-textured sonata form movement in a late-Romantic tonal idiom. The slow movement has been singled out as “expressively beautiful.”
Quartets
String Quartet No. 2 (1946)
A program note for this quartet by the composer reads in part: “The viola introduces the principal theme and the generating material of the first movement. Its sombre mood soon gives way to a vigorous transformation which is sustained until the viola recalls a familiar ostinato figure to conclude the movement. The second movement is lyrical, somewhat nostalgic in feeling, and tempered by muted strings and flute-like harmonics. The final movement, in the rondo manner, displays a capricious rhythm with a twist of humour.”
Quartets
String Quartet No. 3 (1962)
This Quartet is conceived in intimate terms and serves as a memorial to the composer’s mother, who died during the composition of the quartet. Weinzweig stated that it is “a ‘surrealistic’ work ... in that its creation was influenced by the free association literary method of James Joyce. It is a work of shifting moods, fantastic images and considerable unrest and turmoil.”
Quartets
Clarinet Quartet (1965)
The Clarinet Quartet combines serialist compositional technique a jazz-swing feel. The work avoids mundane homogeneity by creating individual profiles based on rhythm, intervals, articulation, and dynamics.
Quartets
Music Centre Serenade (1984)
Music Centre Serenade alternates between a fast seven-measure passage with cadenzas for each instrument.