String quintet

Typical layout

Cello quintet

Viola quintet

String quintet op. 27 No. 3 G303 Mvt2 (last) Minuetto by Luigi Boccherini, arranged for violin and harmonium

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A string quintet is a musical composition for five string players. As an extension to the string quartet (two violins, a viola, and a cello), a string quintet includes a fifth string instrument, usually a second viola (a so-called "viola quintet") or a second cello (a "cello quintet"), or occasionally a double bass.

Notable examples of classic "viola quintets", in four movement form include those of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. Other examples were written by composers including Johannes Brahms and Felix Mendelssohn.

A famous "cello quintet" is Franz Schubert's Quintet in C major. Antonín Dvořák's Quintet Op. 77 uses a double bass, and Mozart's famous Eine kleine Nachtmusik may be performed with this instrumentation (the double bass being optional).

Alternative additions include clarinet or piano (see clarinet quintet, piano quintet); and other closely related chamber music genres include the string quartet (much more common), the string trio, and the string sextet. A more unusual form of string quintet is the violin quintet composed of 3 violins, a viola and a cello (thus a string quartet with an additional violin).

The term string quintet may refer to a group of five players that performs such works. The ensemble was standard in 17th century Italy and can be seen as early as 1607 in Claudio Monteverdi's opera, L'Orfeo.^[1]

• Arnold Bax – Quintet in G major (1908), the second movement of which was rescored by the composer for Viola Quintet and published as the Lyrical Interlude (1923);
• Wilhelm Berger – Quintet in E minor, Op. 75 (1911)^[12]
• Luigi Boccherini – one hundred and ten Quintets. The third movement Minuet of the Cello Quintet Op.11 No.5 is extremely well known.
• Alexander Borodin – Quintet in F minor (1859–1860)
• Luigi Cherubini – Quintet in E minor (1837)
• Felix Otto Dessoff – Quintet, Op. 10
• Friedrich Dotzauer – Quintet in D minor, Op. 134 (1835)
• Felix Draeseke – Quintet in F, Op. 77 (1901)
• Friedrich Gernsheim – Quintet Op. 89 in E♭
• Alexander Glazunov – Quintet in A, Op. 39 (1892)
• Karl Goldmark – Quintet in A minor, Op. 9 (1862)
• Theodore Gouvy – Quintet in G, op 55 is on IMSLP
• August Klughardt – Quintet in G minor, Op. 62 (1902)^[12]
• Frank Martin – Pavane couleur du temps (Colour of weather Pavane), 1920, 7', For quintet.^[13]
• Darius Milhaud – Quintet Op. 350 (1956)
• George Onslow – twenty-five of his thirty-four string quintets are Cello Quintets; five are with two violas and four are with double bass^[7]
• Einojuhani Rautavaara – Quintet "Les Cieux Inconnues" (Unknown Heavens, 1997)
• Ottorino Respighi – Quintet in G minor (1901, incomplete)
• Wolfgang Rihm – Epilog (2013)
• George Rochberg – Quintet for Two Violins, Viola and Two Cellos (1982)
• Franz Schubert – Cello Quintet, Op. post. 163, D 956
• Peter Seabourne – Quintet for Two Violins, Viola and Two Cellos (2012)
• Robert Simpson – Quintet (1995)
• Ethel Smyth – Quintet in E major, Op. 1
• Sergei Taneyev – Quintet in G, Op. 14 (1900–1901)
• Ferdinand Thieriot – Streich-Quintett G-Dur, 1914; others with wind instruments^[14]
• Carl Vine – String Quintet (2009)

• Felix Draeseke – one Quintet in A for Two Violins, Viola, Violotta, and Cello (the Stelzner-Quintett; 1897); Draeseke also composed one Cello Quintet- in F, Op. 77 (1901)