Mitch Friedfeld wrote:

>Okay, Listfolk: What was the first string quartet?  This is a request
>for information, not a trivia question.  BTW, this disc is on sale at
>BMG for $4.99.

According to the New Harvard Dictionary of Music, the string quartet was
an outgrowth of the baroque trio sonata and some early Italinan "Sonatas
a 4." The article goes on to surmise that the first "String quartets"
as we know them were likely by Boccherini, published in 1761 as opus
two.  The author goes on to say that it was Josef Haydn and his
Austro-Hungarian colleagues that codified the genre into what we know
today.

Kevin Sutton