CARNEGIE HALL PRESENTS
Kronos Quartet Young Artists Concert

Zankel Hall
Sunday, March 21st, 2010 at 7:30 PM

The Annex Quartet
·· Melissa Wilmot, Violin
·· Teddy Wiggins, Violin
·· Yunior Lopez, Viola
·· Peter Cosbey, Cello

Callino Quartet
·· Sarah Sexton, Violin
·· Héloîse Geoghegan, Violin
·· Rebecca Jones, Viola
·· Sarah McMahon, Cello

Ragazze Quartet
·· Rosa Arnold, Violin
·· Jeanita Vriens, Violin
·· Annemijn Bergkotte, Viola
·· Genevieve Verhage, Cello

Wei-Mao Huang
Jin Yang

Professional Training Workshops are made possible, in part, by Mr. and Mrs. Nicola Bulgari and the Gladys Krieble Delmas Foundation.

Program Notes:

FRANGHIZ ALI-ZADEH (b. 1947)
Mugam Sayagi

About the Composer

Azeri composer Franghiz Ali-Zadeh's compositions draw from the vocabulary of modern European classical music and incorporate the traditional music of Azerbaijan. She is recognized as a master pianist, having popularized 20th-century works for Eastern European audiences.


In the Composer's Own Words

Kronos encouraged me to use the Azeri musical tradition of Mugami, a secret language used in the 16th century to disguise emotions discouraged in Islam. Through Mugami, the ecstatic longing of a man for a woman could be expressed as the love of God.

Mugam Sayagi begins as a meditation, in darkness. Only the cello is lit, trying to wake the world with the call to prayer. The cello is the composer's voice—a woman. Nothing changes, and you don't believe it can. It goes on and on, and then suddenly explodes in a flash. Concealed passion breaks out in wild dancing or in virtuosic cadenzas. The violin plays an unbounded song of love where the soul flies high into the sky. It's a competition among them all—who can be the most perfect? Then comes the finale, and an end. The cello is alone again, intoning the sunset prayer. The sound of the triangle echoes a myriad of stars.



AGUSTÍN LARA (1897–1970)
Se me hizo fácil (It Was Easy for Me) (arr. Osvaldo Golijov)

Agustín Lara’s rise to fame began in 1930, with the installation of a new radio transmitter in Mexico City that allowed his songs to be broadcast throughout the country. Lara became a tremendously prolific songwriter, penning hundreds of songs that have become standards for many Spanish-language performers. The lyrics to Se me hizo fácil, which has been recorded by singers ranging from operatic superstar Plácido Domingo to the legendary Chavela Vargas, are about erasing from the singer’s memory the love for a woman who has offended him. (Lara was married at least six times.) This version, arranged for Kronos by Osvaldo Golijov, is a fantasy on Lara’s song.

—Sidney Chen



TERRY RILEY (b. 1935)
Prayer Circle (VI) and Royal Wedding (IV), from The Cusp of Magic

About the Composer

Terry Riley first came to prominence in 1964 with the groundbreaking In C, the seminal work of Minimalism in music. His long association with Kronos so far produced more than two dozen works.


In the Composer’s Own Words

The Cusp of Magic significantly fills the picture that my collaboration with Kronos has been portraying for nearly 30 years. My compositions for Kronos are the most important of my notated works, each one staking out a different mood and musical structure. In this work, the different timbre and resonance of the Chinese pipa and the Western string ensemble highlight the crossover regions of cultural reference, so that Western musical themes might be projected with an Eastern accent and vice versa. My plan was to make these regions seamless so that listeners are carried between worlds without an awareness of how they end up there.

The complete work is in six movements. The fourth, “Royal Wedding,” was written for the marriage of Michael and Marina Harrison, which took place when I was working on this piece. The sixth, “Prayer Circle,” is inspired by the Cuban montuno but scored in compound meters. The underlying harmonic progressions are reminiscent of those found in popular music of Cuba and Latin America. “Prayer Circle” is dedicated to world peace.



AVIYA KOPELMAN (b. 1978)
Widows & Lovers

About the Composer

Moscow-born Aviya Kopelman is one of the most prominent composers in Israel today. She was selected in 2007 as the recipient of the fourth commission offered through the Kronos: Under 30 Project, a commissioning and residency program for composers under 30 years of age.


In the Composer's Own Words

Widows & Lovers consists of three parts: White Widow, a potent and rare species of marijuana; Lovers; and Black Widow, a species of spider whose female consumes the male directly after mating.

It was crucial for me to question the relevance of such a homogeneous ensemble as a string quartet in a time when electronic music has stretched the limits of orchestration and sound. I wanted to address the sonic universe that surrounds me, exploring and using the numerous technical possibilities for live performance offered by Kronos Quartet, but without forsaking the strength of the strings as I perceive it—a warm, living, breathing, and deeply expressive sound, which echoes in the heart over centuries.

Widows & Lovers developed out of a game of free associations, and moves between who I am and who I wish to be, between Kronos and myself, between classical chamber music and contemporary life.



CARLOS PAREDES (1925–2004)
Canção Verdes Anos (Song of the Green Years) (arr. Osvaldo Golijov)

About the Composer

Born into a family of guitar masters in Coimbra, Portugal, Carlos Paredes himself became a master and innovator of the Portuguese guitar, bringing a background instrument into the spotlight.


In the Arranger's Own Words

"He plucks, we bow." That was David Harrington's answer to my puzzled look when he suggested that I translate Paredes's pieces, in order to choose a few for a suite. The music made us smile, nod our heads in approval, shout some unprintable words of admiration, and ultimately reduced us to the silence that only truth creates. Even now, I still ask myself whether it is possible at all to transpose to another medium both the magic of Paredes's playing and that of his unique instrument, with its strange tuning and octave and unison doublings that only the sweet innocence of a whole people or the perversity of a Stravinsky could create. The virtuosity of Paredes is charged with meaning; there is street wisdom in his playing—a strange, crooked lyricism, and above all, impeccable taste. My hope in these transcriptions is to sublimate those qualities so that they appear reincarnated in the string quartet's bows.



TAN DUN (b. 1957)
Excerpt from Ghost Opera

The conceptual and multifaceted composer-conductor Tan Dun has made an indelible mark on the world's music scene with a creative repertoire that spans the boundaries of classical, multimedia, Eastern, and Western musical systems.

Tan's Ghost Opera is a five-movement work for string quartet and pipa, with water, metal, stone, and paper. The composer describes this work as a reflection on human spirituality, which is too often buried in the bombardment of urban culture and the rapid advances of technology. It is a cross-temporal, cross-cultural, and cross-media dialogue that touches on the past, present, future, and the eternal; employs elements from Chinese, Tibetan, English, and American cultures; and combines performance traditions of the European classical concert, Chinese shadow puppet theater, visual art installations, folk music, dramatic theater, and shamanistic ritual. In composing Ghost Opera, Tan was inspired by childhood memories of the shamanistic "ghost operas" of the Chinese peasant culture. In this tradition, which is more than 4,000 years old, humans and spirits of the future, the past, and nature communicate with each other.

—Peggy Monastra



ASTOR PIAZZOLLA (1921–1992)
Four, for Tango

Astor Piazzolla was born in Mar Del Plata, Argentina, but he lived in New York for much of his childhood. He returned to Buenos Aires in 1937 and, at the age of 18, began to play bandoneon and work as an arranger for the orchestra of Anibal Troilo, studying composition with Alberto Ginastera. In 1946, Piazzolla formed his own group to expound his evolving radical ideas. He received a government subsidy to study with Nadia Boulanger in France; she counseled him to not abandon the popular music of his heritage. On his return from France, he formed his famous octet, which revolutionized the musical world of Buenos Aires.

His idea was that tango was a music to listen to, not just a music for dance. Nuevo tango is a unique blend of traditional tango, the folk music of Argentina, and his Western classical training. Piazzolla took a folk music and developed a sophisticated art language out of its rudiments, both passionate and modern. Piazzolla composed film scores, operas, and music for television, and he recorded more than 40 albums, including Five Tango Sensations with the Kronos Quartet.



ALEKSANDRA VREBALOV (b. 1970)
… hold me, neighbor, in this storm …

About the Composer

A native of the former Yugoslavia, Aleksandra Vrebalov left Serbia in 1995 and now teaches at the City College of New York.


In the Composer's Own Words

The Balkan region, with its multitude of cultural and religious identities, has a troubled history of ethnic intolerance. For my generation, growing up in the former Yugoslavia meant carrying in our minds countless conflicts dating back half a millennium. Strangely, the cultural and religious differences that led to enmity in everyday life produced the most incredible fusions in music. This piece is inspired by folk and religious music from the region. Peaceful passages grew out of the melodies of prayers as well as escapist tavern songs. … hold me, neighbor, in this storm … is a way to bring together the sounds of the bells of Serbian Orthodox monasteries and the Islamic calls to prayer. It is a way to connect histories and places by unifying one of the most civilized sounds of Western classical music—the string quartet—with ethnic Balkan instruments—the gusle (a bowed string instrument) and the tapan (a large double-headed drum). It is a way to piece together identities fractured by centuries of intolerance.

More Information:

This performance is the culminating event of a weeklong Professional Training Workshop led by Kronos Quartet and Wu Man, featuring three young professional string quartets and two pipa players as they explore collaborative repertoire, including Tan Dun’s Ghost Opera and Terry Riley’s The Cusp of Magic.

The Annex Quartet
·· Melissa Wilmot, Violin
·· Teddy Wiggins, Violin
·· Yunior Lopez, Viola
·· Peter Cosbey, Cello

Workshop Leaders


Kronos Quartet

David Harrington, Violin
John Sherba, Violin
Hank Dutt, Viola
Jeffrey Zeigler, Cello

For more than 30 years, San Francisco's Kronos Quartet has pursued a singular artistic vision, combining a spirit of fearless exploration with a commitment to expanding the range and context of the string quartet. In the process, Kronos has become one of the most celebrated and influential ensembles of our time, performing thousands of concerts worldwide, releasing more than 45 recordings of extraordinary breadth and creativity, collaborating with many of the world's most eclectic composers and performers, and commissioning more than 650 works and arrangements for string quartet. Kronos's work also has garnered numerous awards, including a Grammy for Best Chamber Music Performance (2004) and Musicians of the Year (2003) from Musical America.

Since 1973, Kronos has built a compellingly diverse repertoire for string quartet, performing and recording works by 20th-century masters (Bartók, Shostakovich, Webern), contemporary composers (Aleksandra Vrebalov, John Adams, Alfred Schnittke), jazz legends (Ornette Coleman, Thelonious Monk), and artists from even farther afield (Azeri vocalist Alim Qasimov, avant-garde saxophonist John Zorn).

Integral to Kronos's work is a series of long-running, in-depth collaborations with many of the world's foremost composers, including Terry Riley, whose work with Kronos includes Salome Dances for Peace, the multimedia production Sun Rings, and 2005's The Cusp of Magic; Philip Glass, recording his complete string quartets and scores to films like Mishima; Azerbaijan's Franghiz Ali-Zadeh, who was featured on the 2005 release Mugam Sayagi: Music of Franghiz Ali-Zadeh; Steve Reich, whose Kronos-recorded Different Trains earned a Grammy; Argentina's Osvaldo Golijov, whose work with Kronos includes both compositions and extensive arrangements; and many more.

In addition to composers, Kronos counts numerous artists from around the world among its regular collaborators, including Chinese pipa virtuoso Wu Man; legendary Bollywood "playback singer" Asha Bhosle; Inuit throat singer Tanya Tagaq; Mexican rockers Café Tacuba; and the Romanian gypsy band Taraf de Haïdouks. Kronos has performed live with the likes of icons Allen Ginsberg, Modern Jazz Quartet, Tom Waits, David Barsamian, Howard Zinn, Betty Carter, and David Bowie, and has appeared on recordings by such diverse talents as Nine Inch Nails, Amon Tobin, Dan Zanes, DJ Spooky, Dave Matthews, Nelly Furtado, Rokia Traoré, Joan Armatrading, and Don Walser. Kronos's music features prominently in other media, including film (Requiem for a Dream, 21 Grams, Heat) and dance, with choreographers such as Merce Cunningham and Eiko and Koma.

Kronos spends five months of each year on tour, appearing in concert halls, clubs, and festivals around the world, including BAM Next Wave Festival, Carnegie Hall, the Barbican in London, WOMAD, UCLA's Royce Hall, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, Shanghai Concert Hall, and the Sydney Opera House. Kronos is equally prolific and wide-ranging on disc. The ensemble's expansive discography on Nonesuch Records includes such collections as Pieces of Africa (1992), a showcase of African-born composers, which simultaneously topped Billboard's Classical and World Music lists; 2000's Kronos Caravan, whose musical "travels" span North and South America, Europe, and the Middle East; 1998's 10-disc anthology, Kronos Quartet: 25 Years; Nuevo (2002), a Grammy- and Latin Grammy–nominated celebration of Mexican culture; and the 2003 Grammy-winner, Alban Berg's Lyric Suite.

Kronos's recording and performances reveal only a fraction of the group's commitment to new music. As a non-profit organization, the Kronos Quartet / Kronos Performing Arts Association is committed to mentoring emerging professional performers, and to creating, performing, and recording new works.



Wu Man

Since moving to the United States from China in 1990, pipa virtuoso Wu Man has not only introduced the traditional Chinese instrument and its repertoire to Western audiences, she has successfully worked to give this ancient instrument a new role in today's music. As a result, she has made the pipa accessible to a larger audience, including musicians and composers who value the instrument for its unique tonal qualities and virtuosic character. These efforts were recognized when Wu Man was made a 2008 United States Artists Broad Fellow.

Wu Man continually collaborates with some of today's most distinguished musicians and conductors. She has performed as soloist with many of the world's major orchestras and her touring has taken her to the major music halls of the world. Wu Man is a principal member of Yo-Yo Ma's Silk Road Project, and often performs and records with the groundbreaking Kronos Quartet.

Wu Man began her 2009–2010 concert season at Carnegie Hall as part of Ancient Paths, Modern Voices. Her travels throughout China to select musicians for the festival have been documented on film, Discovering a Musical Heartland: Wu Man's Return to China.

This past November, Wu Man and the Kronos Quartet presented the world premiere of a new staged work with video, A Chinese Home, directed by Chen Shi-Zheng. In May, she is scheduled to perform in Moscow with Yuri Bashmet and the Moscow Soloists, with whom she was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2009 for Best Small Ensemble Performance (world premiere recording of Tan Dun's Pipa Concerto). She also has plans to tour Europe and Asia with the Silk Road Ensemble, in addition to performing with the Taipei Chinese Traditional Orchestra.

Recent recordings include Terry Riley's The Cusp of Magic with the Kronos Quartet on Nonesuch; Traditions and Transformations: Sounds of Silk Road Chicago, featuring Wu Man's performance of Lou Harrison's Pipa Concerto with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on the CSO Resound label; and New Impossibilities with the Silk Road Ensemble on Sony/BMG.

Born in Hangzhou, China, Wu Man studied at the Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing, where she became the first recipient of a master's degree in pipa performance. Wu Man was selected as a Bunting Fellow at the Radcliffe Institute of Advanced Study at Harvard University, and was selected by Yo-Yo Ma as the winner of the City of Toronto Glenn Gould Protégé Prize in music and communication. She is also the first artist from China to have performed at the White House. Visit wumanpipa.org for more information.




The Participants


The Annex Quartet

Melissa Wilmot, Violin
Teddy Wiggins, Violin
Yunior Lopez, Viola
Peter Cosbey, Cello

Recognized for its versatile performance of an eclectic repertoire, The Annex Quartet is making its Carnegie Hall debut. Since its founding in 2008 at The Glenn Gould School of The Royal Conservatory, the quartet has been in high demand throughout Toronto and abroad. Recent performances include recitals in Mazzoleni Hall at The Royal Conservatory, live radio broadcasts on Toronto's CFMZ Classical 96.3, an All-Russian concert in the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre at the Four Seasons Centre for the Performing Arts in Toronto, and a performance at the 2009 Haydn Festival in Montreal. In January 2010, the quartet returned to the Richard Bradshaw Amphitheatre to celebrate the birthday of Brazilian composer Heitor Villa-Lobos by performing his rarely heard Fourth String Quartet.

The Annex Quartet collaborates on a regular basis with many distinguished artists. In 2009, the quartet and mezzo-soprano Nina Lorcini released a recording of Ian McAndrew's Rest. Other projects include performances and recordings of piano quintets by Brahms, Dvořák, and Shostakovich with pianists Samuel Deason, Benjamin Cruchley, and Peter Longworth. The quartet's repertoire includes works by Beethoven, Brahms, Haydn, Janáček, Piazzolla, and Shostakovich.

Callino Quartet
·· Sarah Sexton, Violin
·· Héloîse Geoghegan, Violin
·· Rebecca Jones, Viola
·· Sarah McMahon, Cello

Callino Quartet

Sarah Sexton, Violin
Héloîse Geoghegan, Violin
Rebecca Jones, Viola
Sarah McMahon, Cello

The Callino Quartet was formed at the West Cork Chamber Music Festival in 1999. Its members felt a deep musical affinity, and their debut performance at the festival was an instant success. The quartet embarked on a concert career, and its fresh and enthusiastic approach impressed audiences both at home and abroad. Its members have collaborated with many notable performers, including the Vanbrugh and Belcea string quartets, bassist Edgar Meyer, pianist Barry Douglas, rock band Arcade Fire, and jazz guitarist John Abercrombie.

The quartet has commissioned and premiered new works by Ian Wilson, Raymond Deane, Ronan Guilfoyle, and Kimmo Hakola, and worked closely with Edgar Meyer, Peteris Vasks, Alexander Knaifel, Franghiz Ali-Zadeh, and György Kurtág on their works for string quartet. In 2007, the quartet released its first commercial album on the Riverrun label, and in 2009 year it released an album for Louth Sounds, featuring premiere recordings of quartet works by Valentin Silvestrov and Arvo Pärt. The quartet is particularly proud of its own annual Easter festival that takes place in Cork.

The Callino Quartet has been awarded several international prizes and distinctions, most recently second prize in the 2008 Tromp International String Quartet Competition in the Netherlands. The quartet will be devoting time over the next three years towards researching and performing Haydn’s string quartets on period instruments with the aid of a major Irish Arts Council bursary.

The Callino Quartet takes its name from the Irish air Cailin cois t’Suir a me, or “Girl by the River Suir.” This song was the first Irish air to be notated and became known as the Callino manuscript. It is now on display in Trinity College Library, Dublin.

Ragazze Quartet
·· Rosa Arnold, Violin
·· Jeanita Vriens, Violin
·· Annemijn Bergkotte, Viola
·· Genevieve Verhage, Cello

Ragazze Quartet

Rosa Arnold, Violin
Jeanita Vriens, Violin
Annemijn Bergkotte, Viola
Geneviève Verhage, Cello

The members of the Ragazze Quartet met at the Royal Conservatoire of The Hague and together developed a passion for the art of playing string quartets. They are good friends in addition to their professional career and, as a result, their playing is fresh and enthusiastic.

In 2003, the Ragazze Quartet entered the Dutch String Quartet Academy. There they participated in master classes with leading international musicians as well as lessons from their regular teacher Stefan Metz. Since September 2009, the quartet has participated in the full-time curriculum at the academy, meaning that all four players have made the Ragazze Quartet their primary ambition.

The Ragazze Quartet performs regularly at chamber music venues throughout Holland and has successfully participated in numerous competitions. It won the first prize at the Charles Hennen Concours and was the youngest ensemble to reach the final round in the Dutch National Chamber Music Competition, Almere.

In October 2007, the Ragazze Quartet toured Nepal, where its members met local musicians and shared musical ideas. Aside from its traditional concerts, the Ragazze Quartet works regularly with choreographer Aafje Franken. Together, they have created performances in which music and dance are equally prominent. The musicians are part of the choreography and the dance is involved with the music. Currently, they are planning a program with lighting designer Klaus den Hartog, in which where they will present Philip Glass’s String Quartet No. 5.

The instruments played by Jeanita and Geneviève are kindly on loan from the National Music Instruments Foundation.

Wei-Mao Huang
Wei-Mao Huang

Born in Taipei in 1988, Wei-Mao Huang began to learn pipa with Ming-hsin Wu at the age of eight. A junior student in the Chinese music department at the National Taiwan University of Arts under Hsiu-Chou Lai and other instructors, he also has sought advice from pipa virtuosos in Mainland China several times. He minors in piano and studies music theory under Shih-Pei Ting.

Wei-Mao held his very first solo concert in October 2007. The second took place at the National Recital Hall in February 2009, after his joint concert with Yi-Hsuan Tsai in October the year before. He has performed in many venues since, both as soloist and ensemble member.

Jin Yang
Jin Yang

Pipa player Jin Yang is a teacher at the Wuhan Conservatory of Music. Born in Datong, Shanxi Province, in 1982, Jin began studying liuqin at age four and turned to pipa at nine. She became a student of well-known educator Junsheng Wu in 1994. In 1995, she was admitted to the highly selective music school affiliated with the Central Conservatory of Music, Beijing, and subsequently became a student of the Conservatory itself. There, she studied pipa under the guidance of professors Weixi Sun and Hui Li, and received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the Department of National Music.

In recent years, Jin has performed with the Youth Chinese Orchestra of China, the Chinese Plucking Orchestra of the Central Conservatory of Music, the Girls Band of Orient, and the Chinese Orchestra of Feng Huang. She has performed in Mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, France, the United States, England, Japan, and the Philippines.