GRAEME STEELE JOHNSON | CLARINETIST
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Penderecki: String Quartet No. 3, “Leaves of an unwritten diary”

At the Shanghai Quartet’s 2008 premiere of his String Quartet No. 3 during the composer’s 75th birthday celebration, Krzysztof Penderecki announced from the stage the subtitle “Leaves of an unwritten diary,” suggesting an autobiographical program for the work. Written 40 years its predecessor, the Third String Quartet represents a striking stylistic departure from Penderecki’s earlier contributions to the genre.

The chilling Grave introduction sets the tone for this dark work, full of Penderecki’s characteristic bleakness and mechanical rage. A rabid, seemingly unrelenting waltz follows, but pregnant silences stop the hell-bent waltz dead in its tracks, and the dance grows more demented with each reiteration. Instead of being delineated by movements, this continuous quartet seems to collide head-on with different stylistic areas: the crazed waltz makes many repeat appearances between bodiless harmonic sonorities, haunting sul ponticello (on the bridge) tremolos in all four voices, and a memory of a Hutsul folk melody the composer’s father used to play on violin. As a potpourri of contrasting but always authentic styles, the single-movement quartet functions as a survey of sorts of Penderecki’s compositional activities since his previous quartet.

​© Graeme Steele Johnson for the Norfolk Chamber Music Festival


© Graeme Steele Johnson 2022 | Photos © Grittani Creative LTD, Dylan Hancook, Ed Nishimura, Katie Althen and Mellissa Ungkuldee.
  • Home
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