- published: 09 Feb 2013
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In music, a quartet (French: quatuor, German: Quartett, Italian: quartetto, Spanish: cuarteto, Polish: kwartet) is a method of instrumentation (or a medium), used to perform a musical composition, and consisting of four parts.
In Western art music, which is often referred to as "Classical music," string quartets are considered to be an important type of chamber music. String quartets consist of two violins, a viola, and a cello. The particular choice and number of instruments derives from the registers of the human voice: soprano, alto, tenor and bass. In the string quartet, two violins play the soprano and alto vocal registers, the viola plays the tenor register and the cello plays the bass register. Occasionally, string quartets are written for violin, viola, cello and double bass, representing the SATB format. The types of pieces written for this quartet are sometimes in the format of 2 main voices, (violin and cello) backed up by the viola and double bass respectively.
One of the early composers of string quartets, Luigi Boccherini, wrote 100 string quartets. Other important composers of string quartets include Joseph Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and Ludwig van Beethoven. The term "quartet" is also used to refer to a musical composition written for such a group. In string quartets, each player is typically given an allowing distinct part.
Bebop or bop is a style of jazz characterized by fast tempo, instrumental virtuosity and improvisation based on the combination of harmonic structure and melody. It was developed in the early and mid-1940s. It first surfaced in musicians' argot some time during the first two years of American involvement in the Second World War. This style of jazz ultimately became synonymous with modern jazz, as either category reached a certain final maturity in the 1960s.
The word "bebop" is usually stated[by whom?] to be nonsense syllables (vocables) which were made in scat singing, and is supposed[weasel words] to have been first attested[by whom?] in 1928. Some researchers[who?] speculate that it was a term used by Charlie Christian, because it sounded like something he hummed along with his playing.Dizzy Gillespie tells that the audiences coined the name after hearing him scat the then-nameless tunes to his players and the press ultimately picked it up, using it as an official term: "People, when they'd wanna ask for those numbers and didn't know the name, would ask for bebop."