Terzetto in C Major, Opus 74

By Antonin Dvorak

One of Dvorak's finest achievements in chamber music: all 4 movements are strong, all have beautiful melodies which are richly scored for the 3 instruments. Some parts are challenging for the individual instruments (especially if you take it at full tempo). Another review says the viola part is not...

as difficult, but it has its challenges & you need a good violist for success in this piece, because it provides all the bass line. The International edition is clearly printed, uses letters, no measure numbers (in working with others, measure numbers are indispensable to avoid wasting time). I am preparing this for use at a music workshop; we are using 3 different editions (they are using Barenreiter and Henle), so I compared. The 2nd violin part here has 2 glaring errors in the 4th movement. 3 before J: the unplayable (on violin) chords are supposed to be A-flats; 3rd of M: f-natural on the 3rd beat (not F-sharp). There may be others, so caution is advised (why I knocked off 1 star).

This piece is quite lovely. Parts of it are quite difficult, but there is definitely enough within the range of an intermediate player. As usual the viola part is the easiest. Generally, the notes are not so difficult as the timing, which can take a lot of practice. But it...

is so lyrical that it is worth any amount of work, and once you get it, it simply sings. We are having fun getting it in shape to play for an audience.