Piano quintet Piano quintet In classical music, a piano quintet is a work of chamber music written for piano and four other instruments. The genre particularly flourished in the nineteenth century. Until the middle of the nineteenth century, the instrumentation most frequently consisted of piano, violin, viola, cello, and double bass. Following the phenomenal success of Robert Schumann's Piano Quintet in E major, Op. 44 in 1842, which paired the piano with a string quartet (i.e., two violins, viola, and cello), composers began to adopt Schumann's instrumentation. Among the most frequently performed piano quintets, aside from Schumann's, are those by Franz Schubert,
String Quintet (Bruckner) emphasized. When Bruckner composed his quintet, however, he did not yet know the late quartets of Beethoven - at least according to the statement of the Bruckner researcher Max-Auer, who reports the following: "When Göllerich confessed to this performance [meaning the first performance on 17.11.1881] Bruckner that in the quintet he thinks he recognizes a direct continuation of Beethoven's last quartet, Bruckner, in his modesty, was startled by this comparison with his most revered master, and told him that he unfortunately did not know the last quartets of Beethoven. Göllerich then gave him the scores for the next Christmas." Ernst