 51 quartets before they were published, after which he substantially revised them.During Brahms's lifetime, the string quartet, like the symphony, was a genre dominated by the compositions of Ludwig van Beethoven.In choosing the key of C minor for the first of his quartets, Brahms may have been seeking to acknowledge as well as break free from Beethoven's paralyzing influence, since Beethoven composed some of his greatest and most characteristic works in that key.