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  • String Quartet seating!

    What's the usual or normal seating position for a string quartet - looking at the stage from an audience perspective? I've forgotten and I haven't seen one on tv or live for years.

  • I thought it was (from left to right) Violin 1, Violin 2, Viola and 'Cello (or have things progressed recently?).

    Having said that, I haven't been to a string quartet performance for over 30 years...

  • Sometimes I think it can also be violin1, viola ,cello, violin 2. Hopefully DG will weigh in as I'm sure he's played in his share of quartets.

    Best,
    Jay

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    @JBacal said:

    Sometimes I think it can also be violin1, viola ,cello, violin 2. Hopefully DG will weigh in as I'm sure he's played in his share of quartets.

    Best,
    Jay

    I've always done the Vln1, Vln2, Vla, Cello from left to right.

    DG

  • Here are a number of pics showing vl1,vl2,cello, viola

    http://www.clintonstringquartet.com/images/csq_photo.jpg

    http://www.pereportaconcerts.com/imatges/Fotos/Leipzig%20String%20Quartet2.jpg

    http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/rvp/pubaf/chronicle/v8/f3/hawthorne.gif

    Not sure how common this seating is.

    Best,
    Jay

  • Excellent. Well done lads.

    [:D]

    I've just nearly completed a string quartet thing - and it sounds like all the players are extremely drunk. That's crazy, because the piano part seemed to work and now I'll have rename this to Dorset Cider Party or something like that.

  • Over here, I see a lot vln1, vla, cl, vln2

  • A drunken String Quartet? I am eager to hear it. However, do I also need to imbibe, and should it be before listening, or after?

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    @William said:

    A drunken String Quartet? I am eager to hear it. However, do I also need to imbibe, and should it be before listening, or after?


    Imbibe before, during AND after, probably...

    [:P]

  • Sorry gentlemen - tough day today. I'll talk to you all soon.

  • I don't think there is any hard and fast rule about String Quartet seating. A lot of it is really down to the preference of an individual quartet and how they communicate with each other. I am a big String Quartet fan (in fact a total obsessive), and I have noted that over the years German/Austrian quartets do seem to favour the V1, Va, Cl, V2 seating where as French/British quartets seem more comfortable with V1, V2, Va, Cl. But it is NOT a rule and there are plenty of exceptions.

    From a recording point of view, I think there is much to commend the German approach. And if you've never tried it, it is well worth experimenting with, I find the result more naturally balanced - but it is most definitely a matter of personal taste, since I have some friends (string players) who absolutely loathe the idea!

    The Takacs Quartet usually perform in the V1, Va, Cl, V2 arrangement, and their Beethoven cycle is breath-taking.

  • Paul sure It sounds better then my music.. Yours are drunk.. Mine sounds like there dead.. Figure that one out...Joseph

  • I recently did a short string quartet for a song I wrote. It actually became a quintet technically because I added another cello later on to provide a percussive/rhythm part with détaché. I actually got quite a nice tone by (L-R) Détaché Cello, V1, Viol, Cello, V2.

    I did have a piano and vocal in it too and had the left (bass) hand panned slightly left and the right hand part panned slightly right. So that might have helped it work a little.

  • My mistake, it was V1, D-Cello, Viol, Cello, V2. Got the first two the wrong way round.

  • Well - doesnt it depend on what they are playing? In baroque (really polyphical) music it just makes more sense to have V1-Vla-Cl-V2. For the audience it is easier to distinguish the different lines of V1 and V2 if they are not sitting too close. If the music is more like classical V1-V2-Vla-Cl makes more sense. I also think that this is also true for chamber- or big orchestras. And this was also common in the baroque or classical time - so far as i know. But with a small section like a string-quartett it is also important that the musicians play as they are used to. But i would always ask them for baroque-style-music to sit V1-Vla-Cl-V2.

  • Hi, I have read all this posts and I have not found the one that, in my opinion, is today the most advanced technique of placing the string quartet components on a stage. In Mezzo TV I saw yesterday the retransmission of the integral of the Beethoven String Quartets by The Belcea String Quartet at the Vienna Konzerthaus in 2012. The placement used was (from left to right, watching from the audience): V1 - V2 - Vc. - Va. This integral of the Beethoven Quartets is considered one of the best interpretations of the decade. I believe that this placement of instruments has to do with the extraordinary quality of such an interpretation. I've used this setting (V1 - V2 - Vc. - Va. ) in a recent recording of my Quartet in E flat using VSL in: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HkKu0DI6ug0 Regards, José Candela Madrid

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    @PaulR said:

    Excellent. Well done lads.

    [:D]

    I've just nearly completed a string quartet thing - and it sounds like all the players are extremely drunk. That's crazy, because the piano part seemed to work and now I'll have rename this to Dorset Cider Party or something like that.

    What piano part Paul, in a string quartet? Are you referring to a piano reduction? Nice to hear from you again, and that you still devote some of your time to music instead of joining the pro-golf tour.

    So far as the performers' positions are concerned, it is completely up to you, and depends on the style of your music - if memory serves, Stockhausen put his quartet players in four separate helicopters at one time...

    Now that's a good excuse for being drunk!

    Cheers!


  • Unforunately, this is an old post and PaulR has long ago gone to the Elysium Fields of Olde Englande.  


  • Hi Paul,

    I don't know what is the best or most used seating in a string quartet and possibly there isn't such an issue. As mentioned in this topic there are different views on it, depending on acoustics, concert space, but also on the orchestration. Some quartets will be sounding better V1-Va-Cl-V2, others with the 2 volins on the left hand side. In my experience (I was working with a small chamber orchestra for more than 25 years), we always preferred the seatings with the first and 2nd violins separated. My ensemble had 3 first and 3 second violins, viola, cello or bass and/or bassoon, 2 flutes, 1 clarinet (or oboe), sometimes 1 or 2 recorders, sometimes 1 piccolo traverso. The violins (devided in two groups of 3) were sitting in the front (L and R), the woodwinds a little backward in between, the bass behind them all, a little to the right.

    We tried a lot of positions, but in most halls, this setting sounded great and equilibrated.

    I hope this was a bit helpful.

    Max


  • PaulP Paul moved this topic from Orchestration & Composition on