Schumann and Shostakovich Tickets

Robert Schumann (1810-1856) was a German composer, pianist, and influential music critic. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest composers of the Romantic era. In 1842 Schumann composed the Three String Quartets Op. 41, the Piano Quintet Op. 44 and the Piano Quartet Op. 47, a veritable ‘Year of Chamber Music’. Influenced by the late quartets of Beethoven and the quartets of Haydn and Mozart, Schumann’s string quartets are masterpieces in their own right, filled with musical inventiveness, youthful exuberance and intense poetic feeling. Dmitri Shostakovich (1906-1975) was a Soviet-era Russian composer and pianist. He is regarded as one of the major composers of the 20th century and one of its most popular composers. His music is characterized by sharp contrasts, elements of the grotesque, and ambivalent tonality; he was also heavily influenced by the neoclassical style pioneered by Igor Stravinsky, and by the late Romanticism of Gustav Mahler. The string quartet was written shortly after Shostakovich reluctantly joined the Communist Party. According to the score, it is dedicated "to the victims of fascism and the war." Shostakovich's friend, Lev Lebedinsky, said that Shostakovich thought of the work as his epitaph and that he planned to commit suicide around this time. Program: Schumann String Quartet No. 1 in a minor, Op. 41, No. 1 (1842) Shostakovich String Quartet #8 in C minor, Op. 110 (1960)