Strings at Sunset – The Madison String Quartet

by Tania Spurkland

The Madison String Quartet is returning to Seldovia on Sunday, August 3^rd as part of the Kenai Peninsula Orchestra Summer Music Festival. There will be a pre-concert reception beginning at 7:30 pm on the Seldovia Village Tribe deck. Champagne and hors d’oeurves will be served. The concert will begin at 8:30 pm at the SVT Conference Center. The Madison String Quartet concert is made possible with funding by Rasmuson Foundation through the Harper Arts Touring Fund, and is administered, under contract, by the Alaska State Council on the Arts.

The Madison String Quartet, praised for its energetic performances and inventive programming, is bringing a new side of classical music to the New York metropolitan area and Seldovia, AK. Drawing on the international experience of its members, the Quarter “has carved a niche out for themselves by exploring Hispanic literature from both sides of the Atlantic” (Paul Somers, Classical New Jersey). The Quartet is involved in blurring the line between performer and audience, creating a comfortable performance atmosphere for masterworks from past and present. The Madison String Quartet is essential listening.

The Quartet’s 2004 recording, Life is a Dream, was received with rave reviews, and displays the eclectic programming that has become its hallmark. It included the world premiere of pieces by award-winning composers Miguel del Aguila and Dave Rimelis, as well as quartets by Silvestre Revurltas and Peter Schickele. In addition to championing Latin works, the Quartet has also collaborated with many composers in its home state of New Jersey, including Dale Trumbore, Paul Moravec, and Charles Griffin. New York-based poet Kate Light has worked with the MSQ to present her collection “Einstein’s Mozart”, a performance including poems from her book intertwining the two mens’ lives and work.

Since 2008, the MSQ has been quartet-in-residence at the Kenai Peninsula Orchestra Summer Music Festival in Alaska. In 2012, the Quartet was presented at the Museum of the City of New York by Musica de Cámara, highlighting the quartet by 19^th-century Venezuelan composer Teresa Carreño. Highlights of recent seasons include a performance at Carnegie Hall of Imitación Serial para Cuerdas by composer Modesta Bor, as well as engagements with several chamber series, including the Friends of Westchester, Mozart and Friends in Princeton, and the Rhinebeck Chamber Series. In Rhinebeck, the Quartet gave “a mesmerizing performance of Schubert’s ‘Death of the Maiden’ a quartet the house listened to like a story heretofore untold” (Kitty Montgomery, Kingston Daily Freeman).