MUSICAL COMPOSITION

112 MUSICAL COMPOSITIONcomplete freedom in the relation of the four instrumentsto each other; (6) how to make all four partsequally interesting to the players. Much variety ofactual colour is not possible of attainment in a stringquartet, but each of the three instruments which composeit, the violin, viola and violoncello, has an individualityof its own: the violin the thinnest but themost brilliant, the viola the roundest and possessingmore of the "larmes au voix," the violoncello the mostnasal and incisive in the upper registers, and the mostdignified and sonorous in the lower. (Their counterpartsin the wind family are the oboe, clarinet, homand bassoon). Their range is great, far too great forthe harmony-exercise student to grasp with any ease,and their interweaving powers are almost illimitable.The colour of the whole combination will completelychange when the violoncello or the viola ascend abovetheir brethren in giving out a theme, as the followingexamples from Beethoven's quartet in E fiat, Op. 127,will show:(1),...... VIOL. I. Allegro.~4tCW