Ives Quartet - Press Release

The Ives Quartet will open its 2004-2005 concert season with its Fall Series of programs featuring, "An Andean Walkabout", written in 2001 by one of the Bay Area's rising composers, Gabriela Lena Frank. Also on the program will be Mozart's Quartet in Eb Major, K.428 and the Quartet in F by Maurice Ravel.

The newest and youngest addition to publisher G. Schirmer's prestigious roster of artists, Gabriela Lena Frank has been hailed as representing "the next generation of American composers." Her compositions incorporating South American mythology, art, poetry, and folk music into western classical forms reflect her Peruvian-Jewish heritage and have been described as works of "honesty and genius". Recently, her Three Latin American Dances received its premiere by the Utah Symphony Orchestra (with Keith Lockhart conducting) and was hailed as "brilliant" (Salt Lake Tribune). It was subsequently recorded for the Dorian label (release date Spring 2005) and will be part of the Utah Symphony Orchestra's first major recording in nearly fifteen years.

Ms. Lena Frank's "An Andean Walkabout" will highlight the Ives' Fall program. The work pays homage to the composer's Peruvian roots, incorporating traditional Peruvian song and dance forms and the unique sound of Peru's indigenous instruments. The Quartet in Eb Major, K. 428 is one of six that Mozart dedicated to his dear friend Joseph Haydn. The quartet's melodies bubble with energy and variety. Ravel's only string quartet, the Quartet in F, is a watershed work in the genre, filled with string timbres that were revolutionary for their time.

Formerly in residence at Stanford University as the Stanford String Quartet since 1983, the Ives Quartet departed the university in September of 1998 to seek greater artistic independence. A fully independent touring and recording ensemble, the Ives Quartet now performs home season concert series in San Francisco, Palo Alto and San Jose, is quartet-in-residence at the Rocky Ridge Music Festival in Colorado, and appears on noted chamber music series and festivals nationwide.

The Ives Quartet combines the talent and experience of the international, solo, orchestral, chamber music and recording careers of its artist members - Robin Sharp, Susan Freier, Scott Woolweaver and Stephen Harrison. Each player is an acclaimed performer on his/her instrument, earning distinction with other renowned chamber music ensembles including the Chester Quartet, the Boston Composers' String Quartet, the New England Piano Quartette, the San Francisco Symphony, and the San Francisco Contemporary Music Players. This variety and breadth in each artist's background contributes to the ensemble's unique sound.

The Quartet has captivated audiences from San Francisco to New York, Taiwan to London. Committed to presenting the full scope of the string quartet literature, the ensemble continues to earn critical and popular acclaim for depth and diversity of its programming, with repertoire ranging from recognized classics and neglected masterpieces of the past to new commissions and distinctive collaborations with guest artists. Their recordings, which appear on the Laurel Record, Music and Arts, and AIX Entertainment labels, feature rarely performed, contemporary and commissioned works.

The IQ will complete its recording of the Three String Quartets by Arthur Foote (its fifth CD) in 2004 and continues its educational outreach program to the underserved public schools of the San Francisco Bay Area. This program, jump started by an Exemplary Arts Organization Grant from the California Arts Council, provides in-school master classes and string ensemble instruction.

In production and due for release in 2005 is a DVD of the Brahms Clarinet Quintet, featuring Dmitri Ashkenazy, clarinetist. This is the quartet's second DVD project for AIX Entertainment, following the ensemble's acclaimed DVD of the Brahms Piano Quintet.

The ensemble has appeared most recently at the SLEE Beethoven series at the University of Buffalo and at the Festival of Chamber Music in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. It has also performed at New York's Alice Tully Hall, Princeton University, for the Da Camera Society in Los Angeles, St. John's Smith Square in London and at the Sedona Chamber Music Festival. During the summer months the IQ has been quartet-in-residence at the Rocky Ridge Music Festival in Estes Park, Colorado. The members of the ensemble are violinists Robin Sharp and Susan Freier, violist Scott Woolweaver, and cellist Stephen Harrison.

FALL

DATE: Sunday, September 26, 2004, 2pm
LOCATION: California Palace of the Legion of Honor, Lincoln Park, San Francisco
TICKETS: $25.00 general, $20 seniors, $15.00 students, (415) 392-4400

DATE: Saturday, October 9, 2004, 8pm
LOCATION: St. Mark's Episcopal Church, 600 Colorado Avenue, Palo Alto
TICKETS: $25 general, $20 seniors, $15 students, (650) 328-0990

DATE: Sunday, October 10, 2004, 7pm
LOCATION: Le Petit Trianon Theatre, 72 North 5th Street, San Jose
TICKETS: $25 general, $20 seniors, $15 students, (650) 328-0990