List of string quartets by Béla Bartók

The Hungarian composer Béla Bartók wrote six string quartets, for two violins, viola and cello:

List

 * String Quartet No. 1 (1909), Op.7, Sz. 40, BB 52
 * String Quartet No. 2 (1917), Op.17, Sz. 67, BB 75
 * String Quartet No. 3 (1927), Sz. 85, BB 93
 * String Quartet No. 4 (1928), Sz. 91, BB 95
 * String Quartet No. 5 (1934), Sz. 102, BB 110
 * String Quartet No. 6 (1939), Sz. 114, BB 119

Posterity
Notable composers who have been influenced by them include:
 * Benjamin Britten, particularly in the Sonata in C for Cello and Piano
 * Elliott Carter, who refers in the opening of his own First String Quartet to Bartók's Sixth Quartet
 * Chen Yi
 * Edison Denisov, whose Second Quartet is closely related to Bartók's Fifth Quartet
 * Franco Donatoni, who was deeply impressed when he heard a broadcast of Bartók's Fourth Quartet
 * Robert Fripp, who mentions them as an influence on the band King Crimson
 * Miloslav Ištvan
 * György Kurtág, whose Opp. 1 and 28 both owe a great deal to Bartók's quartets
 * György Ligeti, whose two string quartets both owe a great deal to Bartók's quartets
 * Bruno Maderna
 * George Perle, who credits the Bartók Fourth and Fifth Quartets as precedents for his use of arrays of chords related to one another by different types of symmetry
 * Walter Piston
 * Steve Reich, who described them in an interview as "the greatest set of quartets since Beethoven"
 * Kim Dzmitrïyevich Tsesakow
 * Wilfried Westerlinck
 * Stefan Wolpe, who explained in a public lecture how he had derived ideas from Bartók's Fourth Quartet
 * Xu Yongsan
 * Jouni Kaipainen, credited openly Bartók's quartets as his model.

Recordings
Key recordings of the complete cycle include:
 * Emerson String Quartet, Deutsche Grammophon, released 1990.
 * Hagen Quartet
 * Juilliard String Quartet:
 * Recorded 1949, New York. Robert Mann and Robert Koff, violins; Raphael Hillyer, viola; Arthur Winograd, cello. Three LPs, 12 in., monaural. Columbia Masterworks ML 4278/4279/4280.
 * Recorded May and September, 1963, Columbia 30th Street Studios, New York. Robert Mann and Isidore Cohen, violins; Raphael Hillyer, viola; Claus Adam, cello. Three LPs, 12 in., stereo. Columbia Masterworks D3L 317 (set): ML 6102, 6103, 6104. New York: Columbia Masterworks, 1965.
 * Recorded 13–23 May 1981, Columbia 30th Street Studios, New York. Robert Mann and Earl Carlyss, violins; Samuel Rhodes, viola; Claus Adam, cello.
 * Lindsay String Quartet
 * Takács Quartet, Decca 289 455 297-2. Released 1998.