Jazz on the Back Deck and Lot of Strings Music Festival - Aizuri Quartet

Aizuri Quartet
Lot of Strings Music Festival

Making their highly anticipated Lot of Strings debut, Aizuri Quartet brings their international award-winning musicality to an insightful program that features works by Clara Schumann, Fanny Mendelssohn, and Franz Shubert. Praised by The Washington Post for “astounding” and “captivating” performances that draw from its notable “meld of intellect, technique and emotions,” the Aizuri Quartet was named the recipient of the 2022 Cleveland Quartet Award by Chamber Music America, with other honors including the Grand Prize at the 2018 M-Prize Chamber Arts Competition and top prizes at the 2017 Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in Japan and the 2015 Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition in London.

The Quartet’s sophomore album, Earthdrawn Skies, was released in 2023. Featuring music of Hildegard of Bingen, Komitas Vartapet, Eleanor Alberga, and Jean Sibelius, Earthdrawn Skies was praised by NPR Music as an album that “convincingly connects the dots in wildly diverse music stretching over eight centuries…arousing solemn contemplation, cosmic curiosity, folksy delight and introspective scrutiny.” Aizuri’s debut album, Blueprinting, featuring works written for the Quartet by five American composers, was released by New Amsterdam Records to critical acclaim (“In a word, stunning” —I Care If You Listen), nominated for a 2019 GRAMMY Award, and named one of NPR Music’s Best Classical Albums of 2018.

Aizuri Quartet has previously performed in an eclectic variety of settings: In addition to the world’s great chamber music series, Aizuri opened five nights of performances with legendary Indie Rock band Wilco with quartets by Gabriella Smith, Paul Wiancko, Rhiannon Giddens, and George Meyer at New York’s United Palace Theatre. Aizuri appeared with Wilco on CBS’s The Tonight Show with Steven Colbert. With Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Ken David Masur, Aizuri Quartet performed John Adams’s string quartet concerto Absolute Jest in 2022. During the summer of 2023, they appeared in Kronos Quartet’s Kronos Festival at SFJAZZ, where they played works commissioned by Kronos’s groundbreaking 50 For the Future initiative.

Program:

Clara Schumann: Die stille Lotosblume from Sechs Lieder, Op. 13 No. 6 (1844) Silvestre Revueltas: String Quartet No. 4, Música de Feria (1932)
Fanny Mendelssohn Hensel: String Quartet in E-flat Major (1834)
Franz Schubert: String Quartet No. 14 in D Minor D. 810, “Death and the Maiden”

Bring your own chairs and refreshments and enjoy live entertainment atop the Morris Museum’s elevated parking deck. Patrons are invited to arrive as early as 6:00 PM to set up and enjoy refreshments and stunning sunsets on The Back Deck.

Tickets are $53 for an 8’x8’ block that accommodates up to two patrons or $28 for a block that accommodates one patron. In the event of inclement weather, outdoor performances will be held inside the Museum’s Bickford Theatre as general admission.

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