Dedicated to Thurston Dart Michael Nyman s professor at King s College London much of String Quartet No. 1 borrows and is inspired by the works of seventeenth century composer John Bull whosecomplete keyboard works Dart gave Nyman as a birthday present. The other main source of inspiration was Schöneberg s Second String Quartet from the early 20th century.In his introduction to the piece Nymandescribes his two background ideas when composing the work: first to make an almost orchestral chamber music and second to exorcise the impressive and oppressive history of the String quartet by making his work a compendium ofquotations from the quartet repertoire. Commissioned by the Arditti Quartet and first performed by them in 1985 String Quartet No. 1 has a duration of 25:44 minutes.Michael Nyman is an Englishcomposer of minimalist music pianist librettist and musicologist known for numerous film and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to The Piano . He has additionally written a number of operas six concerti four stringquartets and many other chamber works.
