Ever+Zhang+-+Chamber+Music+and+String+Quartet

__ Chamber Music __ 
 * __ Chamber Music and String Quartet __**
 * Chamber Music** is a type of classical music written for small ensembles. It is originally referred to music composed for home entertainment. There can be two to nine performers and each performer has his/her unique part.

Chamber music is classified according to the number of performers in the ensemble, for example two people in group, is called duet or due. Three people is called trio, four is a quartet, and five is a quintet. Moreover, the further classification is made by the type of instrument played. For example a string quartet includes two violins, one viola, and one cello. A brass quintet includes two trumpets, one French horn, one trombone, and one tuba. Unlike an orchestra, chamber music doesn’t have a conductor.

To write chamber music, composers consider the instruments they are going to use and write melodies suiting each instrument. The melodies become more harmonically directed and take on regular period. The two main forms, of Chamber Music, began to influence each other, the sonata da chiesa and sonata da camera. Sonata da camera remained less regular with four movements. This form was mainly for the dance suite. Sonata da camera kept the relationship to dance rhythms in its movements, except for the first movement. They both applied homophonic style (with a single melodic line supported by chords)

Some of the best works are string quartets written in the Chamber Music style, are by different composers.

__Woodwind Quintet__ [] 

__Brass Quintet__ __[]__ __

String Quartet __  A **String quartet** is a musical genre of Chamber Music, which composed of two violins, one viola and one cello, in several movements. It first flourished in the late 18th century. String Quartets follow the sonata’s division into several movements and it is the principle of form and development. It is mainly used at the beginning of the operas or the background music at a reception. In the early days of the classical era, only the first violin plays the main melody. But at the end of the era, all the instruments were equally involved in both textural and thematic development.

String quartets are usually consisted of four movements. The first movement is most often cast in sonata form. It contains three parts; an exposition of two contrasting melodic ideas, a transition, and a repetition of the first part with changed harmonies. The second movement is generally in a slow tempo. Then followed by a movement in triple metre (at first a minute and later move faster). The last movement consisted of a change of two or more musical ideas in the form of A B A B A or A B A C A.

Some important composers that contribute to String Quartet are Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert. Mozart and Haydn started the genre’s formal outline established typical sequence of four movements as in a sonata or sometimes symphony. Haydn as the father of the String Quartet, he composed 68 of them in his life time. In most of Hayden’s works, he made viola dependent on the cello. So it has the feeling of doubled melodic line.

At the end of the classical period, String Quartet was inherited by many composers such as Schubert who moved it to Romantic era (change to orchestra).

__ Haydn String quartet op. 76/6 in E-flat (mov 1/4) __ [] 

__Beethoven String Quartet Op. 127__ __[]__

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 * chamber music **. (2010). In //Encyclopædia Britannica.// Retrieved May 1, 2010, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online School Edition: []
 * Haydn, Joseph ** . (2010). In //Encyclopædia Britannica.// Retrieved May 1, 2010, from Encyclopædia
 * string quartet ** . (2010). In //Encyclopædia Britannica.// Retrieved May 1, 2010, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online School Edition: []