Premiered in 1919 in Zurich by the leaders of string sections of the Tonhalle Orchestra with Frank Martin himself at the piano, it displays a...

Premiered in 1919 in Zurich by the leaders of string sections of the Tonhalle Orchestra with Frank Martin himself at the piano, it displays a wide variety of influences, all forming part of a 29-year-old musician’s search for his own artistic voice. At the same time, the Quintet’s style is thoroughly individual, notably in its choice of rich harmonies. Providing a marked contrast to Frank Martin’s filigree, pared-down early style, César Franck’s profuse, monumental Piano Quintet in F Minor (1879) is typical of the Franco-Belgian composer’s late output. All of Franck’s characteristics seem to blend together in this work which he wrote at the age of 57: Wagnerian chromatic harmonies, dramatic developments similar to those we know from his symphonic poems and oratorios, and a polyphonic musical thinking “in organ registers”