On Wednesday, March 29, 2017 at 7:30 p.m., the Chiara String Quartet will perform the final concert of the 2016-2017 Hixson-Lied Concert Series at Kimball Recital Hall (11th and R Streets). The program, titled “Beyond Their Years,” will be a celebration of mature younger voices featuring Mendelssohn’s gratifying String Quartet in A minor, Op. 13, written when the composer was only 18 years old, as well as Schubert’s Cello Quintet with cellist Jennifer Son, the Glenn Korff School of Music student winner of the 2017 Play with the Chiaras Competition.
The Play with the Chiaras Competition finals were held on Wednesday, March 1, 2017 between winner Jennifer Son (cello); runner up Hannah Bell (clarinet); and honorable mention Jordan Ellis (viola). The finals were judged by Christopher Marks, UNL Associate Dean and Associate Professor of Organ; William McMullen, UNL Professor of Oboe; Rebecca Fischer, violin, The Chiara Quartet; Hyeyung Yoon, violin, The Chiara Quartet; and Jonah Sirota, viola, The Chiara Quartet.
Canadian-American cellist Jennifer Son has performed in venues in various Canadian provinces, the U.S.A., Korea, and India. She enjoys teaching and has visions to travel to parts of the world where Western classical music education is limited and share her passions there. She has recently been invited as resident artist to music festivals such as Con Brio in Bombay, India where she was given the opportunity to collaborate and teach with artists from around the world. As a Young Artist in Residence at the 2016 Steamboat Springs Music Festival, Son performed with members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and The Cleveland Orchestra. Son has participated in quartet seminars with the St. Lawrence String Quartet at Stanford University, the Aldot Parisot Cello Festival, the Banff Center Cello Festival, the Cello Symposium in Sitka, Alaska, and many more. She also represented British Columbia with her chamber ensemble and won various awards and prizes at the Canadian Nationals Music Competition. Son has served as faculty and music instructor at the Cleveland School of the Arts, Cuyahoga Community College, as well as Interlochen Center for the Arts.
Son is an alumna of the prestigious Vancouver Academy of Music where she began her cello studies with Audrey Nodwell at the age of six. Son received her Bachelors of Music at the Chicago College of Performing Arts with their top scholarship award and completed both her Masters of Music degrees in cello performance and Suzuki Pedagogy at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Son is currently a section member of the Lincoln Symphony Orchestra, and is pursuing her Doctor of Musical Arts degree at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln under the tutelage of Professor Gregory Beaver. She is Hixson-Lied Fellow as well as a Graduate Teaching Assistant for the chamber music program. Her primary teachers include Dr. Tanya L. Carey and Dr. Melissa Kraut.
About the Chiara Quartet: The Chiara Quartet has been playing string quartets and asking probing questions since 2000. Always interested in engaging with the music at its core as well as reaching audiences, the quartet has dedicated itself to finding ways to make the musical experience meaningful for all involved. In this pursuit, the quartet has performed in venues from major concert halls to clubs, created interactive programs for all ages, and most recently taken to performing and recording from memory, or “by heart.” Described by an audience member as “a 3-D experience for the listener,” playing by heart is deeply rewarding for the Chiara as well; memorizing the score helps them to closely relate to the composer’s compositional process. The Chiara’s latest recording is Bartók by Heart, a 2-CD set featuring Bartók’s six string quartets, played entirely from memory, released in August 2016 on Azica. Chiara’s interpretation of Bartók has been reviewed as “a harrowing, landmark achievement” (New York Music Daily) and “with high energy and the freedom to experiment with expression” (All Music). The Arts Fuse describes the quartet’s latest album as “gritty [and] compelling takes on this seminal group of quartets.” The Chiara recently performed complete cycles of the Bartók String Quartets by memory at the Ravinia Festival, National Sawdust in Brooklyn, and at NET Nebraska.
Renowned for bringing fresh excitement to traditional string quartet repertoire as well as for creating insightful interpretations of new music, the Chiara String Quartet (Rebecca Fischer and Hyeyung Julie Yoon, violins; Jonah Sirota, viola; Gregory Beaver, cello) captivates its audiences throughout the country. The Chiara has established itself as among America’s most respected ensembles, lauded for its "highly virtuosic, edge-of-the-seat playing" (The Boston Globe). They are currently Hixson-Lied Artists-in-Residence at the Glenn Korff School of Music at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and were the Blodgett Artists-in-Residence at Harvard University from 2008-2014. For the 2015-2016 season, the Chiara was the quartet-in-residence at The Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.
In addition to the Chiara Quartet’s regular performances in major concert halls across the country, including Lincoln Center's Alice Tully Hall, Carnegie Hall, Philadelphia's Kimmel Center, the Philadelphia Museum of Art, and the National Gallery in Washington DC, the ensemble was one of the first string quartets to perform in alternative venues for chamber music performance. Recent highlights of the Chiara Quartet's international performances include extensive tours of China, Korea, and Sweden.
The quartet’s previous album, Brahms by Heart, was released on Azica in March 2014. The 2-CD set includes Brahms’ String Quartets and his String Quintet No. 2 in G Major, Op. 111 with violist Roger Tapping. The album, played “with infectious charm, exultant phrasing and nostalgic affection” (The Strad), was recorded by Grammy Award-winning producer Judith Sherman at the Troy Savings Bank Music Hall in Troy, New York. Strings raved, “The recording contributes to the feeling of being inside the music, indivisible from the beauty of the playing.” The complete Chiara discography includes a Grammy-nominated recording of Jefferson Friedman’s String Quartets Nos. 2 and 3 on New Amsterdam Records, the Mozart and Brahms clarinet quintets for SMS Classical, and the world premiere recordings of Robert Sirota's Triptych and Gabriela Lena Frank's Leyendas: An Andean Walkabout on the Quartet's own New Voice Singles label.
The Chiara has been committed to the creation of new music for string quartet since its inception, and has commissioned composers including Gabriela Lena Frank, Jefferson Friedman, Nico Muhly, Daniel Ott, Robert Sirota, among others. Recent collaborators in performance include The Juilliard and St. Lawrence String Quartets, Joel Krosnick, Roger Tapping, Todd Palmer, Robert Levin, Simone Dinnerstein, Norman Fischer, Nadia Sirota, and Paul Katz, as well as members of the Orion, Ying, Cavani, and Pacifica Quartets.
In the summer, the Chiara Quartet is in residence at Greenwood Music Camp as well as the University of Nebraska-Lincoln's Chamber Music Institute. The Chiara trained and taught at The Juilliard School, mentoring for two years with the Juilliard Quartet, as recipients of the Lisa Arnhold Quartet Residency. Chiara (key-ARE-uh) is an Italian word, meaning "clear, pure, or light." For more information, visit http://www.chiaraquartet.com.
Chiara String Quartet
in the Hixson-Lied Concert Series
“Beyond Their Years” Featuring Cellist Jennifer Son, Winner of the Play with the Chiaras Competition
Wednesday, March 29, 2017 at 7:30pm
Kimball Recital Hall | University of Nebraska-Lincoln
11th and R Streets | Lincoln, NE
Single Tickets: $20 (Seniors $10, Students $5). Available at the Lied Center for Performing Arts ticket office, at the door, or at 402.472.4747. More information: http://www.arts.unl.edu