String Quintet No. 2 (Brahms) String Quintet No. 2 (Brahms) String Quintet No. 2 in G major, Op. 111, is a work by Johannes Brahms published in 1890. It is known as the "Prater" Quintet. Brahms intended it to be his last piece of music, though he later produced a number of piano pieces and the two sonatas for clarinet or viola and piano. The first performance of the Quintet in Vienna on November 11, 1890 was a sensation (Swafford 1997, p. 568). Like Brahms' earlier string quintet, Opus 88, it is a viola quintet, scored for two violins, two violas and cello. The work
New World String Quartet members were: Curtis Macomber and Vahn Armstrong, violins; Robert Dan, viola; and Ross Harbaugh, cello. Members on recordings in the late 1980s and early 1990s included Curtis Macomber and Vahn Armstrong, violins; Benjamin Simon, viola; and Ross Harbaugh, cello. The quartet also recorded a Brahms piano quintet with Derek Han, piano. The quartet won the Walter W. Naumburg Foundation Chamber Music award in 1979. In 1980 the New World String Quartet became the first quartet-in-residence at Harvard University. The quartet was awarded a Grand Prix du Disque in 1991 for their recording of the string quartets of Debussy, Ravel, and