Tag Archives: Parker Quartet

Standard

Posted by

Posted on

November 22, 2021

Posted under

Performance Reviews

Comments

Leave a comment

The Parker Quartet: Love Letters across the Centuries

Program features works by Adolphus Hailstork, György Kurtág, Alban Berg and Schumann. 

By Izzy Fincher Nov. 22 at 9:15 a.m.

Alan Berg’s Lyric Suite from 1926 has been called “a latent opera.” The sweeping, programmatic, six-movement work, mostly built on a 12-tone row, certainly feels like one. 

Through hidden musical devices and quotations, Berg depicts his passionate, yet doomed love affair with a married woman, Hanna Fuchs-Robettin. He even uses numerology to turn his and Hanna’s initials a motif of paired notes, A-Bb and B-F for H.B. and H.F. It’s the ultimate musical love letter. 

This suite was the centerpiece of the Parker Quartet’s performance in Grusin Hall on Sunday (Nov. 21) as the guest artists for CU Presents’ Takács Quartet series. Despite their eclectic program, which ranged from contemporary works by Adolphus Hailstork, György Kurtág (one of the quartet’s early mentors) and Alban Berg to a string quartet by Schumann, the performance felt cohesive, tied together by themes of love and loss across the centuries.  

Parker Quartet (L-R: Jessica Bodner, Daniel Chong, Ken Hamao, Kee-Hyun Kim). Photo by Luke Ratray.

Founded in 2002 at the New England Conservatory, the Parker Quartet has established itself as one of leading string quartets for traditional and contemporary repertoire in the U.S. Their 2011 album, Ligeti: String Quartets Nos. 1 & 2, received a Grammy Award for the Best Chamber Music Performance, and they have premiered works by leading contemporary composers, including Jeremy Gill, Augusta Read Thomas and Zosha di Castri. The quartet members are currently artists-in-residence at Harvard University.

The concert opened with the reflective Adagio from Hailstork’s String Quartet No. 1, based on a choral piece written for his Norfolk Unitarian church that is set to a text about being a generous, loving Christian man. Following this, the quartet’s charismatic violinist Daniel Chong introduced the theme of the program: love in its various forms. This would be continued in Kurtág’s Aus der Ferne V (From afar), a brief, mournful work dedicated to his late friend and publisher Alfred Schlee, who rescued many contemporary scores from the Nazis; Berg’s Lyric Suite; and Schumann’s String Quartet No. 3 in A major, a 23rd birthday present for his beloved wife, Clara. 

In the evocative Aus der Ferne V, cellist Kee-Hyun Kim drove the piece forward with ominous pizzicato, reminiscent of a heartbeat, over the sustained lines on the violins and viola that exploded in short dissonant bursts before gradually fading away. 

This three-minute vignette set the scene for the highlight of the program, Berg’s Lyric Suite, which Chong described as “the most expressive string quartet in the canon” in his introduction. In the suite, the Parker Quartet demonstrated their impressive ability to blend, while bringing different instruments out of the texture as needed, creating a dialogue out of the building and developing motifs. Through their expressive use of colors and dynamics, they also captured the contrasting moods Berg experiences as he falls madly in love and later descends into despair. 

In the first movement, marked Allegretto gioviale, the Parker Quartet burst into joyful motion led by Chong’s lively opening gesture. This energy built through the next four movements, which all have expressive names: Andante amoroso, Allegro misterioso—Trio estatico, Adagio appassionato and Presto delirando—Tenebroso. 

In the third movement, the hidden initials motif appears most frequently, amidst the combination of wandering pizzicato and warbly lines that sound more chaotically improvisatory than mysterious, an instability the Parker Quartet communicated very well before building to the agitated trio and the dynamic presto that ends with a climactic flourish. The final movement, Largo desolato, which includes the iconic Tristan motif associated with eternal love, demanded the most musical versatility from the musicians, as moments from earlier happier movements appear briefly before sinking into despair. 

Following this depressing love story, the Parker Quartet shifted to a light-hearted work for the second half, Schumann’s String Quartet No. 3. After an hour of intense contemporary repertoire, this leap back into an earlier era felt a bit strange. Given the crowd’s excited chatter during intermission, however, a familiar work seemed to be a welcome respite after atonal explorations. 

During his career, Schumann only wrote three quartets. They were written together as Op. 41, a birthday present to his wife that was composed in the span of five weeks in 1842. These quartets incorporate elements of Schumann’s influences from Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and his friend Mendelssohn, while still retaining his own personal, Romantic style and at times expanding it. 

In their animated interpretation of No. 3, the Parker Quartet exhibited their impeccable synchronicity, bow strokes moving as one. With clear, strong downbeats, Kim on cello led this, though perhaps a bit too forcefully in the calmer Adagio molto movement. With the last movement, a showy crowd pleaser marked molto vivace, the quartet ended the performance on an uplifting note, a reminder of the excitement and joy of young love.  

The program will be repeated at 7:30 p.m. tonight, Nov. 22, in Grusin Hall. Tickets are available here.

Standard

Posted by

Posted on

November 17, 2021

Posted under

Performance Previews

Comments

Leave a comment

The Parker Quartet from Harvard will perform Sunday and Monday at CU

They will play in Grusin Hall as guests of CU’s Takacs Quartet

By Peter Alexander Nov. 17 at 5:20 p.m.

The Parker Quartet may be the only string quartet named for a hotel.

Formed when the original members were students at the New England Conservatory, they wanted a name that reflected their connection to Boston. “None of us is from Boston, but we call Boston home,” says Ken Hamao, the quartet’s second violinist. “To have a landmark from the city to name ourselves after was appropriate.”

Parker Quartet. Photo by Luke Ratray

Today the Parker Quartet members maintain their ties to Boston, as Blodgett Artists-in-residence and faculty at Harvard University’s department of music. 

The landmark is the Parker House, which you may recognize from dinner rolls but which was an important gathering place for America’s literary figures in the 19th century, including Emerson, Hawthorne and Thoreau, and later for politicians including presidents U.S. Grant, Franklin D. Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy and Bill Clinton.

The Parker Quartet will perform at 4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 21, and 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 22, in Grusin Hall. They are appearing in the guest slot on the fall concert series of CU’s Takacs Quartet. Their eclectic program features the Lyric Suite by Alban Berg and the Third String Quartet of Robert Schumann, as well as shorter works by Adolphus Hailstork and György Kurtág.

Both in-person and digital tickets can be purchased from CU Presents. Masks are required in all indoor spaces in the CU campus, regardless of vaccination status.

Alban Berg

The central work on the program is Berg’s Lyric Suite, an emotionally and musically challenging work in six intense movements. It has always been seen as a dramatic and passionate piece of music, but more than 50 years after it was written in 1926, a secret “program” was found embedded in the score that explained the intensity of the music.

A combination of musical initials standing for the composer and his lover, multiple other musical symbols, the inclusion of Wagner’s Tristan chord and other musical references, all reflect Berg’s passionate and illicit affair with a married woman, Hanna Fuchs-Robettin. Even the movement titles suggest the subject: amoroso (lovingly), appassionato (passionately) and estatico (ecstatic).

But you don’t need to know the story to appreciate the music, Hamao says. “For us as performers, it helps us to get into the composer’s mindset, but on its own it’s just a very dynamic work, hugely expressive,” he says.

“We’ve been talking about performing it for many years, and after so many years you want to tell each other, ‘Let’s just go for it’. It’s really exciting (because) it has that drama, the very, very highs and the very, very lows of the affair. It did make sense (with) the Schumann as a companion piece. The Lyric Suite is as passionate as it also is desolate, while the Schumann is more uplifting.”

Calra Schumann. Portrait by Franz von Lenbach

Hamao describes the Schumann Third Quartet as representing a different kind of romantic love, that of the composer for his wife, Clara Schumann. “It’s just a love letter to his wife,” he says. “From the very first two notes that you hear, this Clara motive, he’s yearning for his wife. From the first page it’s a declaration of love.”

Hailstork’s Adagio is a piece that the quartet discovered more recently. “It was a piece that we fell in love with immediately and wanted to program it as soon as we can,” Hamao says. “In a program that can be as intense as the Lyric Suite can be, having this beautiful Adagio made a lot of sense to us.

“I think of it as an incredibly beautiful piece that kind of discovers itself throughout the whole piece. It’s definitely tonal but has what you might call notes that don’t quite belong to the scale. For a beautiful piece there’s a lot of surprises, but at the end of the day it’s a really gorgeous movement.”

Kurtág’s Aus der Ferne (From the distance) V is one of a group of pieces for different media. Two of are for string quartet—Aus der Ferne III and V. The Parker Quartet has worked directly with the composer in the past, and recently released a CD recording of his quartets, including those two miniatures. 

“Kurtág has an incredible ability to tap into the idea of drama,” Hamao says. “There is a sense of narrative. I don’t think there is an explicit one, but an abstract narrative. He’s able to pack a story into two minutes of music. [He has] this incredible ability to create a lot of expression through quite minimal means.”

Whatever narrative you discover will have to be “in each listener’s imagination,” Hamao says, but that is part of the reward for both performer and listener.

# # # # #

Parker Quartet

  • Adolphus Hailstork: Adagio from String Quartet No. 1
  • György Kurtág: Aus der Ferne V (From the distance)
  • Alban Berg: Lyric Suite
  • Schumann: String Quartet No. 3, Op. 41 No. 3

4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 21
7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 22
Grusin Recital Hall, CU Imig Music Building

In-person and Sunday live stream tickets available from CU Presents

Standard

Posted by

Posted on

September 10, 2021

Posted under

Performance Previews

Comments

1 Comment

Takács Quartet opens 2021–22 campus concert series Sunday

Performances will be available for in-person attendance and streaming

By Peter Alexander Sept. 10 at 4:30 p.m.

The CU College of Music and the resident Takács Quartet go into the 2021–22 academic year with a full schedule of on-campus concerts.

Naturally, this marks a change from last year, when COVID-19 and construction in the Imig Music Building prevented the usual activities in the college from taking place in person. What effect the emergence of the Delta Variant of COVID-19 will have remains unknown, but for now the live series gets under way at 4 p.m. Sunday (Sept. 12) in Grusin Music Hall with a full concert program. The Takács series also includes guest performances by the Parker Quartet from Harvard University.

Takács Quartet— Amanda Tipton, Photographer

At this time, masks are required in public indoor spaces on the CU Boulder campus regardless of vaccination status. Furthermore, an order from Boulder County Public Health also mandates masks indoors in public spaces throughout Boulder County. This order applies, regardless of vaccination status, to all persons age two and up. Dates in the future remain subject to any changes in university policy. 

As in past years, all Sunday Takács programs are scheduled to be repeated on Monday evenings. Each concert will also be available through a ticketed live stream Sunday afternoon that will remain available up to one week after the Monday performances. Details and tickets to live performances and the streams are available through CU Presents.

In addition to familiar works from the standard repertoire—quartets by Haydn, Mozart and Schubert—the Takács Quartet will play two important works by Czech composers that are heard less often. These are the String Quartet No. 2 by Leoš Janáček, titled “Intimate Letters” by the composer (Sept. 12 & 13); and the String Quartet No. 1 by Smetana, titled ”From My Life” (Oct. 31 & Nov. 1).

Written in 1928, Janáček’s Quartet No. 2 was inspired by the composer’s unrequited love for a married woman nearly 40 years his junior. The title refers to the more than 700 letters between Janáček and the woman, Kamila Stösslová, who remained emotionally distant but was with the composer when he died. Janáček wrote to Stösslová, “You stand behind every note” of the quartet.

One of his last works, the quartet was premiered a month after Janáček’s death.

Smetana’s quartet was also written relatively late in the composer’s life and is also autobiographical. The name “From My Life” was provided by the composer, making the quartet, and along with Janáček’s Quartet No. 2, one of the few deliberately programmatic chamber works. 

The first three movements refer to different stages in Smetana’s life—his youthful romanticism, his love for dancing as a young man, and his love for his wife. The final movement dramatizes the persistent ringing that developed in the composer’s ears in his later years, represented by a sustained high E, and his subsequent loss of hearing.

The quartet was composed in 1876 and given its official public premiere in 1879. For an earlier private performance the viola part, which has a prominent solo at the beginning of the first movement, had been played by the young Dvořák.

Another lesser known work will be performed during the fall, Henri Dutilleux’s Aini la nuit (“Thus the night”) Oct. 31 and Nov. 1. Composed over period of years 1973–76, Dutilleux’s quartet was inspired in part by the quartets of Beethoven, Bartók and the 12-tone works of Anton Webern.

A meticulous composer who has a relatively small output, Dutilleux was not a strict adherent of serialism, although he does make use of pitch series. The quartet, aimed at evoking a sense of the night, is in seven strongly contrasting movements with four very short interludes he called “parentheses” serving as transitions between movements.

Though performed relatively infrequently, Ainsi la nuit is regarded as one of the most important works for string quartet from the late 20th century.

Parker Quartet. Photo by Luke Ratray.

The Parker Quartet, whose members are Blodget Artsists-in-Residence at Harvard University’s College of Music, will complete the fall series with guest performances Nov. 21–22. Their program has not yet been announced.

# # # # #

Takács Quartet
Fall 2021 concert series

Takács Quartet

  • Haydn: String Quartet in F minor, Op. 20 No. 5 
  • Leoš Janáček: String Quartet No. 2, “Intimate Letters” 
  • Schubert: String Quartet No. 14 in D minor, “Death and the Maiden”

4 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 12; 7:30 p.m. Monday, Sept. 13
Grusin Music Hall 

Takács Quartet

  • Mozart: String Quartet in D minor, K421
  • Henri Dutilleux: Ainsi la Nuit
  • Smetana: String Quartet No. 1 “From My Life”

4 p.m. Sunday, Oct. 31; 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 1
Grusin Music Hall 

Parker Quartet

  • Program TBA

4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 21; 7:30 p.m. Monday, Nov. 22
Grusin Music Hall 

In addition to live performances, each concert will be streamed live on  Sundays, and each stream will remain available until one week following the Monday performances. Details and tickets to both live performances and the streams are available through CU Presents.