Amar Quartet
Encyclopedia
The Amar Quartet, also known as the Amar-Hindemith Quartet, was a musical ensemble
Musical ensemble
A musical ensemble is a group of people who perform instrumental or vocal music. In classical music, trios or quartets either blend the sounds of musical instrument families or group together instruments from the same instrument family, such as string ensembles or wind ensembles...

 founded by the composer
Composer
A composer is a person who creates music, either by musical notation or oral tradition, for interpretation and performance, or through direct manipulation of sonic material through electronic media...

 Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...

 in 1921 in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

, and was extremely active in both classical and modern repertoire until being disbanded in 1929. It made several recordings and many broadcasts.

A string quartet founded in 1987 by the sisters Anna Brunner and Maja Weber adopted the same name in 1995 in tribute to Hindemith and is increasingly active at the present time. It plays on four Stradivarius
Stradivarius
The name Stradivarius is associated with violins built by members of the Stradivari family, particularly Antonio Stradivari. According to their reputation, the quality of their sound has defied attempts to explain or reproduce, though this belief is controversial...

 instruments. See external links.

Personnel

1st violin
  • Licco Amar (1921-1929)


2nd violin
  • Walter Caspar (1921-1929)


viola
  • Paul Hindemith (1921-1929)


violoncello
  • Rudolf Hindemith (1921)
  • Maurits Frank (c1922-c1924)
  • Rudolf Hindemith (c1924-1927)
  • Maurits Frank (1927-1929)

Origins

From c1914 Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith
Paul Hindemith was a German composer, violist, violinist, teacher, music theorist and conductor.- Biography :Born in Hanau, near Frankfurt, Hindemith was taught the violin as a child...

, a graduate of Hoch Conservatory
Hoch Conservatory
Dr. Hoch’s Konservatorium - Musikakademie was founded in Frankfurt am Main on September 22, 1878. Through the generosity of Frankfurter Joseph Hoch, who bequeathed the Conservatory one million German gold marks in his testament, a school for music and the arts was established for all age groups. ...

 at Frankfort-am-Main, had taken the second violin desk in the Rebner Quartet of Frankfort, led by his violin teacher Adolf Rebner
Adolf Rebner
Adolf Franklin Rebner was an Austrian violinist and violist....

. He continued to play in quartets during the war while in military service, and after the war took up the viola and asked to be moved to that desk. He had written string quartets in 1915 (op 2) and 1918 (op 10), and in 1920 produced another (op 16) which was accepted for performance in the new 1921 Donaueschingen
Donaueschingen
Donaueschingen is a German town in the Black Forest in the southwest of the federal state of Baden-Württemberg in the Schwarzwald-Baar Kreis. It stands near the confluence of the two sources of the river Danube ....

 Festival. However Gustav Havemann, leader of the Havemann Quartet engaged for it, refused to perform the work, and therefore Hindemith was obliged to form a group to give his own premiere. He chose his younger brother Rudolf (dedicatee of the work) as cellist, and obtained Licco Amar, a Budapest Conservatory graduate and 1915-1920 concertmaster of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra
The Berlin Philharmonic, German: , formerly Berliner Philharmonisches Orchester , is an orchestra based in Berlin, Germany. In 2006, a group of ten European media outlets voted the Berlin Philharmonic number three on a list of "top ten European Orchestras", after the Vienna Philharmonic and the...

, and then of Mannheim
Mannheim
Mannheim is a city in southwestern Germany. With about 315,000 inhabitants, Mannheim is the second-largest city in the Bundesland of Baden-Württemberg, following the capital city of Stuttgart....

 Nationaltheater, as first violin and Walter Caspar as second.

The performance was duly given, and in 1922 the Quartet became permanent and began giving recitals, specialising in modern music, and was soon extremely busy. Rudolf Hindemith, who found working under his brother's authority irksome, left and was replaced, but returned for a period during which the quartet's recordings were made and the London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

 (BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 sponsored) debut was given (December 1926). Soon afterwards he left again permanently. The group was disbanded in 1929.

Recordings

The Amar Quartet made recordings for the Polydor Records
Polydor Records
Polydor is a record label owned by Universal Music Group, headquartered in the United Kingdom.-Beginnings:Polydor was originally an independent branch of the Deutsche Grammophon Gesellschaft. Its name was first used as an export label in 1924, the British and German branches of the Gramophone...

 label, including the following:
  • Beethoven: Quartet in F minor op 95 'Serious' (Polydor)
  • Mozart: Quartet in E flat major K 428 (Polydor)
  • Bartok: Quartet no 2 (Polydor 66425-8)

(These three items above are reissued on CD as Arbiter 139.)
  • Hindemith: Quartet no 3 op 22 (atonal) (Polydor 66422-4) (deleted by 1936).
  • Hindemith: String Trio no 1 op 34, 1st & 3rd movts. (Amar-Hindemith Trio) (Polydor 66573-4). (deleted by 1936)
  • Mozart: Quartet in D minor K 421, 2nd & 3rd movts. (Polydor 9351).
  • Mozart: Quartet in F major. (Polydor 66416-8).

Sources

  • A. Eaglefield-Hull, A Dictionary of Modern Music and Musicians (Dent, London 1924).
  • R.D. Darrell, The Gramophone Shop Encyclopedia of Recorded Music (New York 1936).
  • T. Potter, Amar Quartet recordings re-issue (Arbiter Records 139), sleevenotes.

See also


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