Brentano Quartet w/ Hsin Yun Huang (viola) March 1, 2009

Program:
Haydn: Quartet TBA; Hyla: Howl (w/Taped Narrator) [Phila Premiere]; Mendelssohn: Quintet in B-flat Major, Op. 87

"Spectacular…Superbly balanced…Sublime." (The Washington Post)

Named after Antonie Brentano, considered by many to be Beethoven's "Immortal Beloved," the Brentano String Quartet was formed in 1992 and soon garnered both the first Cleveland Quartet Award and the Naumburg Chamber Music Award. The group has worked closely with some of the most important composers of our time, and will perform a new and eagerly anticipated work by Lee Hyla. Of Hyla's Howl based on a poem by Allen Ginsberg Mr. Steinberg (the Brentano's first violinist) writes: "I spent a few hours today rereading the poem and a selection of essays about the poem by various intellectual figures. I find it a wonderful, engaging, exuberant and eminently musical poem; what's more it would be quite hard to argue at this point in time that it is not one of the most important American works of the 20th century, inspiring to so many. It speaks of some difficult things, of the search for truth and freedom and the ways in which we confront the limits of society."

Also on the program are works by Haydn and Mendelssohn's second viola quintet in B-flat Major, which has the Brentanos joined by the superb violist Hsin-Yun Huang (formerly of the Borromeo Quartet). Although Mendelssohn signed and dated the quintet, he reported to his friend Ignaz Moscheles (composer, conductor and pianist) his dissatisfaction with its exuberant finale. (Mendelssohn was habitually self-critical and particularly demanding of his writing for violin.) That he withheld publication of the work suggests that Mendelssohn intended to rework portions of the last movement, but such a rewrite never took place, and this quintet was published posthumously as Op. 87.

For more information and a complete biography on the Brentano Quartet, please visit www.brentanoquartet.com.

For additional information on the composers being performed on this program, please visit:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Felix_Mendelssohn
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Franz_Joseph_Haydn
http://www.leehyla.com

Buy Tickets!
www.pcmsconcerts.org or 215.569.8080

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Get to know the Brentano Quartet!

Watch: The Brentano Quartet performing excerpts from Mendelssohn's final string quartet in F Minor, Op. 80.

Part I:


Part II:


Listen and Connect: Listen to several audio excerpts from the Brentano Quartet http://www.davidroweartists.com/html/BRENTANO/brentano_media.htm

Or read a fascinating article in The New Yorker highlighting the Brentano: http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/musical/2008/05/05/080505crmu_music_ross