My String Quartet No. 8 is made up of three movements, and a fast tempo prevails almost throughout the entire work. The extreme brevity of the opening movement oscillates between rugged unisono passages and cascades of chords. The central movement is a set of variations based on the theme from the first eight bars of my beloved Alla danza tedesca, the enigmatic dance movement from Beethoven’s String Quartet op. 130. I have not written any explicit variations for many years. I feel as though the ...