'21st-Century String Quartets' on Your Kindle, Nook, or iPad
In 1989 at New York’s Town Hall, the Manhattan String Quartet gave a five-concert series called “The Soul of Dmitri Shostakovich,” presenting his 15 string quartets as well as the Piano Quintet, after having taken several trips to the Soviet Union in connection with the project. During that time, they recorded some of these works for Centaur Records, and they have just released the complete cycle on a new six-volume set of CDs for ESS.A.Y. Recordings. In 1990, they performed the complete string quartets of Bartók and Schoenberg in four concerts at Town Hall, so our conversation revolved around the different problems and rewards of a total immersion in the works of these three composers.
What gave you the idea of playing all this Shostakovich?
ROY LEWIS We started with No. 8. It’s the one everybody starts with, because it’s a wonderful piece. People really respond to it emotionally and you can easily put it on any program. But we were intrigued, because we heard he wrote 14 more quartets, and when we asked around for another good one, some friends suggested No. 3. We found very much the same kind of audience response, and it was also really exciting and meaningful for us to play. Next, we tried No. 10 and it was wonderful, and we said, “Why is nobody playing these pieces?”
Many of these quartets seem so autobiographical, full of personal coding, almost.
ERIC LEWIS Yes, that’s what we’re doing, decoding, as we live with these pieces over the years and meet other people who have played them, particularly people from the Soviet Union who knew Shostakovich. It is a fascinating picture, and a big part of it came into focus for us last summer when we got together with [Rostislav] Dubinsky, the former leader of the Borodin Quartet, and now the violinist of the Borodin Trio. We were in Canada at a festival and he came up for a week to teach and talk about Shostakovich.
 21st-Century String Quartets
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Revealing conversations and profiles take you backstage with today's most notable string quartets. Read more from the Manhattan String Quartet, as well the Juilliard, Emerson, Tokyo, and Mendelssohn String Quartets to name just a few. With its tremendous insights into this most passionate and intimate form of chamber music, 21st-Century String Quartets is a must-have addition to your literary collection whether you perform, teach, study, or simply delight in string music. Now available exclusively in e-book format: download your copy to your Kindle, Nook, or iPad today! |
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