Homage to Schoenberg and Bartók: Symmetry, Transpositional Combination and Octatonicism in the First Movement of Roberto Gerhard's Quartetto No. 3

Abstract

The first movement of Roberto Gerhard's Quartetto No. 3 (ca. 1927), his final assignment under Schoenberg, represents a direct homage to the teacher. Gerhard finished the movement with a clearly identifiable allusion to the minor and major chords that close Schoenberg's String Quartet in F♯ minor No. 2, Op. 10 (1907–8). Furthermore, he employed the four-note set resulting from the fusion of these chords (pc set 4–17) as the movement's generative idea, expanding its main structural properties, namely inversional symmetry and transpositional combination, to inform the movement's large-scale sonata layout and a number of configurations of key structural importance throughout the movement. In the development, he elaborated Schoenberg's materials by implementing a technique used extensively by Bartók at the time, namely the combination of dyads with one or more transpositions of themselves for generating larger (often octatonic) structures. Gerhard's compositional method in the movement shows not only the decisive impact of Schoenberg's principles but also his indebtedness to the music of Bartók, to whom the composition seems to pay tribute as equally as to Schoenberg. This article utilises these perspectives to offer an analysis of the first movement of Gerhard's Quartetto No. 3/Concertino.