Béla Bartók composed his Piano Quintet while at grammar school in Pozsony (Pressburg, now Bratislava), and it still shows the influence of Brahms in its melody and harmony. The work was always resoundingly successful at his youthful concerts. When on 7 January 1921 the Waldbauer Quartet wanted to repeat the programme of a concert given ten years previously, Bartók was displeased that this early work of his should be performed once again. Finally he consented to the performance, and played the piano part himself. The quintet was greeted with tumults of applause, unlike the other pieces on the programme, which were written later. According to a communication by Márta Ziegler, Bartók threw away the score in anger, and for many years it was believed to have been destroyed. In 1963, the editor Denijs Dille received a package inside which were the score and parts, which had been thought lost.

Denijs Dille wrote: 'In preparing the text of this edition for practical purposes, I used the autograph score, and Bartók's own handwritten parts for the first and second violins, viola, and cello. [...] Bartók made so many deletions and significant changes in the score that the resulting version was somewhat different from the original. In this edition we give the last version, supplemented with the minor changes and signs that can be found in the string parts.'