String Quartet Seating

[richardfinegold]

Yesterday we toured Taleisin , Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and studio about 40 miles west of Madison, Wisconsin . Wright also designed furniture to be used in his structures and one of his creations was a music stand for a string quartet that would have required the players to sit in a square at right angles to each other. Wright reportedly hated the look of music stands. It’s beautiful piece and very much fits the room for which it was designed but who wants to hear music by players arrayed like that? For Wright form was the thing and function be damned.
It did get me thinking about the way quartet players are positioned. I think I’ve never seen any arrangement except the quarter circle, with the two violins stage right and the viola and cello on the other side.
Have ensembles experimented with alternative seatings? At the very least it might be interesting to spread the violinist more,
I have several Blu Ray Audio recordings by the Autumn Quartet on the Tacet label that deliberately place the listener in the middle of the Quartet in a multi channel system. It’s an interesting perspective if not one that I would routinely recommend.

[french frank]

Don't know how authoritative this blog is, but it has some interesting comments on seating history.

https://stringquartethistory.wordpress.com/evolution-of-seating-arrangement/

[mopsus]

A few years ago a family member heard the Navarra Quartet play Beethoven's op. 131. The viola player sat between the violinists, so at the point where a phrase is 'thrown' round the four players in order, it jumped about instead of moving round the semi-circle. Beethoven presumably had the now standard arrangement in mind.

[pastoralguy]

I heard the Takács Quartet during this year’s Edinburgh Festival and their viola player sat opposite the first violin and indeed his predecessor had done. However, as the concert went so his chair appeared to move so he was almost facing the audience. It was a solution to the problem of the viola’s sound facing away from the auditorium.

[vinteuil]

Yesterday we toured Taleisin , Frank Lloyd Wright’s home and studio about 40 miles west of Madison, Wisconsin . Wright also designed furniture to be used in his structures and one of his creations was a music stand for a string quartet that would have required the players to sit in a square at right angles to each other. Wright reportedly hated the look of music stands. It’s beautiful piece and very much fits the room for which it was designed but who wants to hear music by players arrayed like that?

... there is surely a difference if a quartet is playing for an audience or purely for themselves.

If Frank Lloyd Wright envisaged a quartet playing for their own enjoyment with no audience I think his approach makes a lot of sense

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[AuntDaisy]

... there is surely a difference if a quartet is playing for an audience or purely for themselves.

If Frank Lloyd Wright envisaged a quartet playing for their own enjoyment with no audience I think his approach makes a lot of sense
.

I wonder why FLW didn't use a 3D tetrahedral arrangement, the players would be equidistant from each other?

[richardfinegold]

I wonder why FLW didn't use a 3D tetrahedral arrangement, the players would be equidistant from each other?

I don’t think he cared about the sonic outcome

[vinteuil]

I wonder why FLW didn't use a 3D tetrahedral arrangement, the players would be equidistant from each other?

... I like the idea. In practice it might be a bit tricky : for the performers to have ideal visual and aural understanding, the bottom three should be on seats facing upwards at an angle, manageable - but I worry about the player on top (presumably the first violin) who would have to be strapped in to some kind of upside-down seating, looking down on his/her/their colleagues. No, playing the violin while upside-down looks a step too far...

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[AuntDaisy]

... I like the idea. In practice it might be a bit tricky : for the performers to have ideal visual and aural understanding, the bottom three should be on seats facing upwards at an angle, manageable - but I worry about the player on top (presumably the first violin) who would have to be strapped in to some kind of upside-down seating, looking down on his/her/their colleagues. No, playing the violin while upside-down looks a step too far....

Possibly

To even out the experience, how about strapping them all to a large structure that rotates? Perhaps a much bigger version of this desk toy?
It should generate some interesting Doppler & sonic effects for the audience...

[vinteuil]

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... or they could each have their own helicopter -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helikopter-Streichquartett

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[Pulcinella]

Not totally unrelated.....
I wonder how monks etc coped with clustering round their lectern/music stand with part books or whatever.
Many stands were two sided, I think; were any four?

[Serial_Apologist]

One well-established string quartet began performing while standing up in the 1990s. I can't right now remember which...

[vinteuil]

One well-established string quartet began performing while standing up in the 1990s. I can't right now remember which...

... a pretty heroic cellist?

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[mopsus]

One well-established string quartet began performing while standing up in the 1990s. I can't right now remember which...

A couple of years ago I saw the Heath Quartet perform standing up (apart from the cellist).

[Padraig]

One well-established string quartet began performing while standing up in the 1990s. I can't right now remember which...

The Brodsky Quartet.Paul Cassidy, viola, from Derry; married to Jacqueline Thomas, cello, who played standing up sometimes.