Divertimento

Bartók composed his Divertimento for string orchestra in August 1939. It was the last work he completed before he and his wife, repelled by the pro-Nazi government that now ruled their native Hungary, left the country and relocated to New York. The Divertimento had been commissioned by Paul Sacher, the founder and conductor of the Basel Chamber Orchestra in Switzerland; Bartók wrote the work’s three movements in 15 days, while staying in Sacher’s chalet near Bern. The lively style of the two outer movements relates to Bartók’s interest in folksong, large amounts of which he had collected in villages across Eastern Europe. But besides the music’s winsome melodic appeal there is also a sense of sadness, as if the composer is already looking back wistfully on the Hungarian scene he was about to leave behind. This feeling comes to a head in the slow second movement; here the music explores a relentlessly dark emotional world, building to a fierce central climax before ending in bleak resignation.