A true hollow self-portrait of Dimitri Chostakovitch, the famous Quartet No. 8 in C minor has been the subject of several arrangements that further extend its expressive power. As Bach once did, the Soviet composer uses his initials, DSCH, for the first bars of his work before citing some of his most important works to disappear into nothingness.

A major figure in Hungarian music, the pianist and composer Ernö Dohnányi was still on the benches of the Academy of Fine Arts in Budapest with his fellow student Bartók when he composed his Quintet for piano and strings No. 1, which owes doubly to Brahms, both in its writing and by the fact that the old composer, very admiring, recommended the work of his young colleague to his publisher. It exudes an astonishing maturity and a perfect mastery of content and form.