Grande Fugue tantôt libre, tantôt recherchée pour 2 violons, alte & violoncelle....Oeuvre 133.

Vienne: Chez Artaria. [1827]. First edition. Parts. Folio (32 x 25.5cms). Violin I: 10 p. Violin II, viola & cello: 9 p. each. Engraved throughout. [PN] 877. In fine condition, with a small red pencil "16" to the head of each part. Rare first edition of one of the central masterworks of Western Music. Hoboken 524; Kinsky p.405.


The 'Grosse Fuge' , Op. 133, is a single-movement composition for string quartet, a massive double fugue, which originally served as the final movement of Beethoven's Quartet No. 13 in Bb major (Op. 130). He then replaced it with a new finale and published the Fugue separately in 1827 as Op. 133. Composed in 1825 when Beethoven was completely deaf, it was first performed in 1826, as the finale of the Bb quartet, by the Schuppanzigh Quartet. Now considered among Beethoven's greatest achievements, Igor Stravinsky called it "an absolutely contemporary piece of music that will be contemporary forever." (Stravinsky/Craft "Dialogues and a Diary," p.24) (7233)

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