Piano Quintet No. 2 (Dvořák) Piano Quintet No. 2 (Dvořák) Antonín Dvořák's Piano Quintet No. 2 in A major, Op. 81, B. 155, is a quintet for piano, 2 violins, viola, and cello. It was composed between August 18 and October 8, 1887, and was premiered in Prague on January 6, 1888. The quintet is acknowledged as one of the masterpieces in the form, along with those of Schumann, Brahms and Shostakovich. The work was actually composed as the result of the composer’s attempt to revise an earlier work, Piano Quintet in A major, Op. 5. Dvořák was dissatisfied with the Op. 5 quintet and
String Quintet (Bruckner) his piano arrangement of the slow movement were intended for printing. While the Viennese critics Gustav Dömpcke, Max Kalbeck and Eduard Hanslick responded to the string quintet dismissively to hostile, the Bruckner admirers Theodor Helm and Ludwig Speidel praised the originality and sound beauty of the new work. Thus, in 1884, Theodor Helm emphasized: "While the finale of the Bruckner Quintet - at least the effect of first-time listening - is in doubt, the three remaining movements are of the highest interest, especially in the happy and original invention of the motives. ... But the pearl of the quintet is