Dover Quartet

Named one of the greatest string quartets of the last 100 years by BBC Music Magazine, the two-time GRAMMY-nominated Dover Quartet is one of the world’s most in-demand chamber ensembles. The group’s awards include a stunning sweep of all prizes at the 2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition, grand and first prizes at the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition, and prizes at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition. Its honors include the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant, Chamber Music America’s Cleveland Quartet Award, and Lincoln Center’s Hunt Family Award.

DOVER QUARTET
Joel Link, violin
Bryan Lee, violin
Julianne Lee, viola
Camden Shaw, cello

PROGRAM:

Strum – Jessie Montgomery (b. 1981)
Quartet No. 1, “Kreutzer Sonata” – Leos Janácek (1854 – 1928)
Quartet No. 12 in F major, Op. 96, “American” – Antonín Dvorák (1841 – 1904)

Intermission

Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 11 – Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky (1840 – 1893)

Tickets from $43 |K-12 Students free with accompanying adult | All fees included

Dover Quartet Notes by Dr. Jack Burt

Jessie Montgomery: Strum
Jessie Montgomery was born in New York City, the child of a playwright and a composer. She is the composer-in-residence of the Sphinx Virtuosi. She has received commissions from the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Orpheus Chamber Ensemble. Her music has been performed by the Concertgebouw Orchestral of Amsterdam, and numerous American orchestras. She writes about Strum:

“Strum is the culminating result of several versions of a string quintet I wrote in 2006. It was originally written for the Providence String Quartet and guests of Community MusicWorks Players, then arranged for string quartet in 2008 with several small revisions. In 2012 the piece underwent its final revisions with a rewrite of both the introduction and the ending for the Catalyst Quartet in a performance celebrating the 15th annual Sphinx Competition. Originally conceived for the formation of a cello quintet, the voicing is often spread wide over the ensemble, giving the music an expansive quality of sound. Within Strum I utilized texture motives, layers of rhythmic or harmonic ostinati that string together to form a bed of sound for melodies to weave in and out. The strumming pizzicato serves as a texture motive and the primary driving rhythmic underpinning of the piece. Drawing on American folk idioms and the spirit of dance and movement, the piece has a kind of narrative that begins with fleeting nostalgia and transforms into ecstatic celebration.”

Janácek: String Quartet No 1 “Kreutzer Sonata”
The two string quartets by Leos Janácek are like no other, and are some of the most intense, emotionally gripping works in the literature. The emotional temperature of these works is unflinching, direct, and honest.

The String Quartet No. 1, written in 1923, carries the subtitle, Kreutzer Sonata. In effect, this is a quartet by Janácek, about a novella by Tolstoy, named after a violin sonata by Beethoven. Janácek was inspired to write this piece after reading the 1899 Novella, “Kreutzer Sonata,” by Leo Tolstoy. The disturbing story, dealing with sexual and domestic violence, is told from the perspective of the perpetrator, yet Janácek’s thoughts were of the victim. “I was imagining a poor woman, tormented and run down, just like the one Tolstoy describes in his Kreutzer Sonata,” Janácek confided in one of his letters.

The quartet begins with a gut-wrenching gesture, which appears repeatedly in various guises and intensities. Janácek’s unique style, melodically folkloric, yet rhythmically and harmonically modern, is evident throughout. Its rhythmic complexities, and modal harmonic style sound both modern and traditional. The writing for the instruments themselves is also highly individualistic. The sound world is enormous; at climactic moments, the collective sound of the quartet far exceeds what one might have expected from four string instruments. In its four movements, the quartet traces an enormous range of expression, tender longing, emotional hysteria, and violent aggression, ending in exhaustion.

Dvorák: String Quartet No. 12 in F major, op. 96
Dvorák wrote the American Quartet, his 12 th of 14, in 1893, on summer vacation from his teaching position as Director of the American Conservatory in New York City. The quartet was composed shortly after completing his work on the Symphony No. 9, From the New World. He spent the summer in a Czech immigrant community in Spillville, Iowa. There he was happy and relaxed, finding rural Iowa more to his liking than the intensity of New York City.

He wrote to a friend, “When I wrote this quartet in the Czech community of Spillville in 1893, I wanted to write something for once that was very melodious and straightforward, and dear Papa Haydn kept appearing before my eyes, and that is why it all turned out so simply.”

In Spillville, Dvorák was exposed to different American musicians and styles. He was delighted by America’s folk music – both by what was at the time considered Native- American music, as well as Negro spirituals. Whether these appear consciously in his American works, or are simply inferred, has been constantly debated. That he was inspired by what he heard is not in doubt. He admitted that “ I would never have written my American works ‘just so’, if I hadn’t seen America.” Listeners often equate the pentatonic character of many of the melodies as sounding “American”, but pentatonicism is a feature of the folk music of many countries, including Dvorák’s native Bohemia.

The American Quartet balances formal clarity (hence his reference to “Papa Haydn”), and tunefulness. It’s spirit is happy and uncomplicated. During the composition of the quartet Dvorák was annoyed by noisy bird, “all red, with black wings,” whose chattering disrupted his concentration. He went so far as to notate its call, and make use of it in the Scherzo, giving it to the 1 st violin in mm. 21-24. Ornithologists have debated whether Dvorák heard a Scarlet Tanager, or a Red-Eyed Vireo. The calls of both birds are similar. Dvorák may have misidentified it, thinking the red bird was the noisemaker. Tanagers are much easier to spot, and Vireos are smaller, and hard to locate. Musicologists have also entered the fray. There are scholarly articles in both fields (search: “Dvorák’s bird”). If you have the Merlin Bird ID App on your phone, you can listen to their songs and decide for yourself.

The first public performances of the quartet took place in Boston, on the January 1, 1894, by the Kneisel Quartet, who would go on to also give the American premieres of the Ravel, and Debussy quartets, and Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht.

Tchaikovsky: String Quartet No. 1 in D major, op. 11
Tchaikovsky composed his First Quartet in 1871, as part of chamber music concert organized to showcase his works, this coming before his reputation had grown to what it would become. Chamber music composition was never a point of emphasis for Tchaikovsky. His reputation as the iconic romantic composer is built upon his large scale works: 6 Symphonies, his many ballets, concertos, and operas. Unlike these larger works, this quartet is traditional in layout, structurally clear, taut and disciplined.

This quartet and the Dvo?ák American, follow the same 4 movement layout: an opening Allegro; a slow, lyrical movement; a quick, dance movement; and a brisk, energetic Finale. Both owe their debts to “Papa Haydn.”

The second movement, Andante cantabile, is rightly famous on its own. Taken from a Ukrainian folksong, called “Uncle Vanya Sits on the Sofa,” it was immediately popular, and would appear in many other arrangements. Tchaikovsky himself later arranged it for solo cello and string orchestra in 1888. This movement eventually had a greater personal meaning to Tchaikovsky. He told the story of sitting next to Leo Tolstoy during a concert in which this quartet was performed. Tolstoy, Tchaikovsky related to a friend, “burst in to tears during my Andante cantabile.” In recent years, vocalist Bobbie McFerrin recorded the Cello and Orchestra arrangement on his album, Paper Music, with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

Much thanks to Dr. Jack Burt for writing program notes for this concert.

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