April 8 & 9: San Francisco's Telegraph Quartet Presented in Two Virginia Performances
Photo of the Telegraph Quartet by Lisa Marie Mazzucco available in high resolution at: www.jensenartists.com/artists-profiles/telegraph-quartet
The Telegraph Quartet Performs in Norfolk and Williamsburg, Virginia
Performing the Music of
Fanny Mendelssohn, George Walker, and Antonin Dvořák
Monday, April 8, 2024 at 7:30pm
Kaufman Theater at Chrysler Museum of Art
1 Memorial Place | Norfolk, VA
Tickets and Information
Tuesday, April 9, 2024 at 7:30pm
Williamsburg Regional Library | 515 Scotland St. | Williamsburg, VA
Tickets and Information
New Album: Divergent Paths (Azica Records)
Available Now
“precise tuning, textural variety and impassioned communication” – The Strad
Norfolk & Williamsburg, VA – The award-winning, San Francisco-based, Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello), a group described by The Strad as having "precise tuning, textural variety and impassioned communication,” will be presented in two performances on Monday, April 8 in Norfolk, VA and Tuesday April 9 in Williamsburg, VA. For each of these concerts, the Bay area ensemble will perform a program featuring Fanny Mendelssohn’s String Quartet, George Walker’s String Quartet No. 1 “Lyric” and Antonin Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 14 in A-flat Major, Op. 105 B. 193.
On April 8 at 7:30pm, the Telegraph Quartet will be presented in concert by the Feldman Chamber Music Society at the Kaufman Theater at Chrysler Museum of Art (1 Memorial Place). Then on Tuesday April 9, the group will travel to Williamsburg where they will be presented in concert by the Chamber Music Society of Williamsburg at the Williamsburg Regional Library (515 Scotland St.).
Each of the works on the Telegraph Quartet’s program are directly shaped by significant relationships and delicate emotional connections in the composers’ lives. In hearing them together, one gets not only an artistic performance but also a glimpse into how these composers viewed their respective relationships via melodic expression. There’s a degree of personal intimacy one can take away from the music that extends beyond straightforward historical facts.
Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel wrote her String Quartet in the shadow of her highly praised brother Felix, taking a bold step and ultimately choosing to embrace her own musical voice rather than defer to a style or form that would have been more accepted by her sibling and long time musical confidant. George Walker’s Lyric poses a more direct but no less meaningful interpersonal connection, as a tribute to his grandmother Melvina King. The relationship itself is obvious but what makes it even more powerful is Walker’s decision to turn away from the more widely used mathematical musical style being used in America at the time, in favor of the more emotionally driven neo-romantic style, in order to write a piece fitting of the vision Walker had for honoring King. Dvořák’s final chamber work, his String Quartet No. 14 in A flat-major, doesn’t extend ties to a specific individual the way Mendelssohn’s and Walker’s works do. However, the 1895 quartet embodies a profound relationship all the same: Dvořák’s vacillating connection to the cultures of the United States – where he wrote part of the quartet – and his love of the Bohemian culture and his home in Prague, where he eventually completed the piece. Known for their technical prowess and appreciation for the history behind music and the experiences of composers, the Telegraph Quartet will blend their own deeply forged relationships with each of these works to bring the unique ties of each song to life with an engaging and attentive artistry.
The Telegraph Quartet’s latest album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths, was released on August 25 via Azica Records. The first in the Telegraph’s three-album series focused on string quartets of the first half of the 20th century, Divergent Paths explores the bewildering and unbridled creativity of the period through the music of Arnold Schoenberg and Maurice Ravel, whose music on this album weaves threads of great contrast and surprising similarity. The album has been met with critical acclaim, with The New York Times reporting, “[I]n the Schoenberg, they achieve something truly special, meticulously guiding its often wayward progress. At times Schoenberg makes the four strings sound almost orchestral, but the Telegraph players can also make his contrapuntal tangles radiantly clear. Every minute of their account sounds gripping and purposeful, which is one of the highest compliments you can pay the piece.”
More about Telegraph Quartet: Described by the San Francisco Chronicle as, “an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape” and “powerfully adept… with a combination of brilliance and subtlety,” the Telegraph Quartet was awarded the prestigious 2016 Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award and the Grand Prize at the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition.
The Quartet has performed in New York City’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Chamber Masters Series, and at festivals including the Chautauqua Institute, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and the Emilia Romagna Festival. They have collaborated with pianists Leon Fleisher and Simone Dinnerstein; cellists Norman Fischer and Bonnie Hampton; violinist Ian Swensen; composer-vocalist Theo Bleckmann; St. Lawrence Quartet, and the Henschel Quartett. A fervent champion of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, the Telegraph Quartet has premiered works by John Harbison, Osvaldo Golijov, Robert Sirota, and Richard Festinger. In 2018 the Quartet released its debut album, Into the Light, featuring works by Anton Webern, Benjamin Britten, and Leon Kirchner on the Centaur label. The Telegraph Quartet released its new album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths––which features Ravel’s renowned quartet and Schoenberg’s first quartet––on August 25 via Azica Records.
Based in the San Francisco Bay Area, the Quartet is currently on the chamber music faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as the Quartet-in-Residence and has given master classes at the SFCM Collegiate and Pre-College Divisions, through the Morrison Artist Series at San Francisco State University, and abroad at the Taipei National University of the Arts, National Taiwan Normal University, and in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Telegraph has also served as artists-in-residence at the Interlochen Adult Chamber Music Camp, SoCal Chamber Music Workshop, and Crowden Music Center Chamber Music Workshop. In November 2020, the Telegraph Quartet launched ChamberFEAST!, a chamber music workshop in Taiwan and in fall 2020, Telegraph launched an online video project called TeleLab, in which the ensemble collectively breaks down the components of a movement from various works for quartet.
For more information, visit www.telegraphquartet.com.
For Calendar Editors:
Description: The award-winning Telegraph Quartet, described by The New York Times as being “full of elegance and pinpoint control,” is presented in two performances on Monday, April 8 and Tuesday April 9, 2024 –– both at 7:30pm. Both concerts will feature the Bay Area ensemble performing a program featuring three works that are shaped by immensely personal experiences and relationships, written during the 19th and 20th centuries: Fanny Mendelssohn’s String Quartet in E-flat major (1834), George Walker’s String Quartet No. 1 Lyric (1946) and Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 14 in A-flat Major, Op. 105 B. 193 (1895).
Short description: The Telegraph Quartet, which is described as “full of elegance and pinpoint control” (The New York Times), is presented in concert by Lebanon Valley College on Friday, April 5, 2024 at 7:30pm. The ensemble will perform the music of Walker and Dvořák.
Concert details:
Who: Telegraph Quartet
Presented by Feldman Chamber Music Society
What: Music by Fanny Mendelssohn, George Walker, and Antonin Dvořák
When: Monday, April 8, 2024 at 7:30pm
Where: Kaufman Theater at Chrysler Museum of Art, 1 Memorial Place, Norfolk, VA 23510
Tickets and information: www.chambermusicwilliamsburg.org/telegraph-quartet-april-9-2024/
Who: Telegraph Quartet
Presented by Chamber Music Society of Williamsburg
What: Music by Fanny Mendelssohn, George Walker, and Antonin Dvořák
When: Tuesday, April 9, 2024 at 7:30pm
Where: Williamsburg Regional Library, 515 Scotland St., Williamsburg, VA 23185
Tickets and information: www.feldmanchambermusic.org/telegraph-quartet-april-8-2024/