Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concert
JACK Quartet

​FREE EVENT
​Sunday, April 29 from 5-6 PM   MAP IT  ​


Widely known as “superheroes of the new music world” (The Boston Globe), the JACK Quartet returns to the Neighborhood Concert series. With its “impeccable musicianship” and “take-no-prisoners sense of commitment” (The Washington Post), the ensemble has embarked on thrilling exploratory collaborations with such composers as Steve Reich and John Luther Adams. Among its many prizes are New Music USA’s prestigious Trailblazer Award and the CMA/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming. The JACK Quartet regularly performs at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Wigmore Hall, and other noteworthy venues.

Program
ERIN GEE: Mouthpiece XXII (2015) 
PHILIP GLASS: String Quartet No. 8 (2018) 
MARK APPLEBAUM: Darmstadt Kindergarten (2015) 
AMY WILLIAMS: Richter Textures (2011) 

Performers
JACK Quartet
·· Christopher Otto, Violin
·· Austin Wulliman, Violin
·· John Pickford Richards, Viola
·· Jay Campbell, Cello

About the Program
Erin Gee’s Mouthpiece XXII examines the string quartet through Erin’s unique mind as a performer of new vocal techniques. JACK uses a menagerie of delicate methods to excite surprising textures: from high harmonics, to whistling while playing, whispering phonemes, a variety of pizzicati, as well as a rhythmically slow and wide vibrato. The piece comes in and out of focus as a strange and secret magnetism pulls and pushes these sonic curios in and out of our consciousness.

Mouthpiece XXII was commissioned by Musikprotokoll for the 40th Anniversary for the Arditti Quartet.

String Quartet No. 8 is the eighth of the “numbered” quartets. Some other un-numbered quartets have been composed for film and theater productions—such as the films Dracula and Bent. String Quartet No. 8 is meant as a concert work and cast in a traditional three-part “fast-slow-fast” format. It is based on a free mixture of neoclassical and traditional harmonic music, which adds a playful and whimsical flavor to the otherwise solemn string quartet repertoire.—Philip Glass

String Quartet no. 8 was co-commissioned by the Winnipeg New Music Festival and Carnegie Hall for Glass’ 80th birthday.

The title Darmstadt Kidergarten alludes to the famous summer music courses held in Darmstadt, Germany. For decades composers such as Cage, Boulez, Nono, and Stockhausen met to share their latest musical sounds and ideas. The festival came to be known as a hotbed of the most gritty, modernist contemporary music, stuff aimed decidedly at mature audiences and, as a consequence, sometimes lacking the ludic sense of play that makes childlike enterprise so appealing (and perhaps in need of rehabilitation). Commissioned originally for a Kronos Quartet’s children’s concert, I wanted to compose a piece that could appeal at once to audiences of varying age, experience, and affinity for levity, gravity, whimsy, and rigor, something worthy of a “Darmstadt kindergarten.” The piece consists of a seventeen-measure “theme,” composed in two versions: instrumental and choreographic. The instrumental version is played conventionally on two violins, viola, and cello; the choreographic version calls for the players to substitute silent hand gestures—lavishly described in the score—for their instrumental sounds. The instrumental “theme” is repeated five times in immediate succession. During each successive statement one additional player is permanently removed from the instrumental group and instead plays the choreographic version. The hand gestures are executed at precise moments corresponding to the rhythms from the player’s instrumental part. Darmstadt Kindergarten is thus a piece that is partly about memory; the audience is invited to “hear” the instrumental material when later voiced by choreographed action. Music can indeed be expressed even in the absence of sound.—Mark Applebaum

Darmstadt Kindergarten was commissioned for the Kronos Quartet by the David Harrington Research and Development Fund.

Each of the seven short movements of Richter Textures was inspired by a different painting by German artist Gerhard Richter (b. 1932). The selected paintings—some landscapes and some abstract—all have complex and strikingly beautiful textures. In his abstract works, Richter gradually builds up many layers of non-representational painting. Likewise, each movement of the music has one texture (sometimes alternating with a contrasting texture) that comprises the main sound material; however, the subtle details of motivic, rhythmic and timbral variation add a layer of complexity. The seven movements, each possessing a distinct sound world, are to be performed without pause. --Amy Williams

Richter Textures was commissioned by the Fromm Music Foundation of Harvard University for the JACK Quartet.

About Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concerts
​Carnegie Hall celebrates more than 40 years of partnering with local community organizations to present free Neighborhood Concerts featuring outstanding main-stage artists as well as exciting rising stars of classical, jazz, and world music. These performances tap into the pulse of diverse communities across New York City and bring local residents together to share in the joy of music.
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​Presented in collaboration with
Carnegie Hall’s Neighborhood Concerts is a program of the Weill Music Institute.
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Lead support for Neighborhood Concerts is provided by the Howard Gilman Foundation.

Additional support is provided by the A.L. and Jennie L. Luria Foundation.

Photo: Shervin Lainez