Dvorák's Piano Quartet in E flat major, Op. 87, had its premiere in November of 1890, just before the creative beginnings of the great "Dumky" trio, Op. 90. The quartet, however, while not devoid of folk influences, falls on the pan-European side of the duality that pervaded and animated Dvorák's work. Its outer movements are expansive, quite Brahmsian essays in sonata form, with characteristic touches in the instrumental writing such as the rapid exchange of tremolos between violin and viola at the end of the first movement. The second movement, marked Lento, is one of Dvorák's most purely lyrical, with a sequence of five themes, shifting in mood. The third movement, the most folkloristic of the four, consists of two contrasting dances; its central section deploys the piano in such a way that it sounds, perhaps, like a hammer dulcimer or other Eastern European folk instrument. The work is an unjustly neglected masterpiece of the chamber music repertoire, an unfailing crowd-pleaser but possessed of an originality that makes it worthy to stand beside the more complex corners of Brahms' chamber output.

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