Kronos Quartet

The Chan Centre for the Performing Arts at UBC launches an extraordinary 2013/14 season with audience favourites the Kronos Quartet on Saturday, October 19 in a performance entitled Kronos at 40 in the Chan Shun Concert Hall.

For four decades, San Francisco’s Kronos Quartet – David Harrington (violin), John Sherba (violin), Hank Dutt (viola), and Sunny Yang (cello) – has combined a spirit of fearless exploration with a commitment to continually re-imagining the string quartet experience.

In the process, Kronos has become one of the world’s most celebrated and influential ensembles, performing thousands of concerts worldwide, releasing more than 50 recordings, collaborating with many of the world’s most eclectic composers and performers, and commissioning over 800 works and arrangements. Collaborators include iconic and diverse artists such as John Adams, Allen Ginsberg, David Bowie, Tanya Tagaq, Asha Bhosle, Wu Man, and Homayun Sakhi, who shared the Chan Centre stage with Kronos in 2011.

Philip Glass

The concert will celebrate the ensemble’s 40 years of innovation with the world premiere of Philip GlassString Quartet No. 6, as well as selections from Kronos’ critically acclaimed 2009 album Floodplain, a Canadian premiere by Montréal-based composer, Nicole Lizée, and other works.

The group has a rich history of collaboration with preeminent composer Glass, who will be on hand for the monumental occasion.

Glass will give an exclusive talk for ticket holders prior to the concert, hosted by Eleanor Wachtel from CBC Radio’s Wachtel on the Arts as part of the Dal Grauer Memorial Lectures. This special pre-concert conversation will take place at 6:30 pm in the Chan Shun Concert Hall.

“We feel enormously privileged to host this historic, world premiere concert,” according to Joyce Hinton, Co-Managing Director of the Chan Centre. “One of our mandates is to commission new works, and it is wonderful to be able to do so on the occasion of both Kronos’ anniversary season, as well as the UBC Faculty of Arts’ 50th anniversary. This concert looks to the past, at the ensemble’s decades of accomplishment, and also to the future, with the introduction of an important new Glass composition.”

One of the music world’s most prolific and influential creators, Glass is the composer of more than 20 operas, eight symphonies, multiple concerto and chamber pieces, as well as a range of film soundtracks. His pioneering musical style is typified by its extensive use of repetitive structures, as demonstrated in his opera Einstein on the Beach, and in films including The Hours and Koyaanisqatsi.

Kronos at 40

Date: Saturday, October 19, 8 pm
Pre-concert conversation with Philip Glass, 6:30 pm, Chan Shun Concert Hall
Venue: Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, 6265 Crescent Road, Vancouver
Tickets: Available via Ticketmaster, via phoning 1.855.985.(ARTS) 2787, or in person at the Chan Centre ticket office, 6265 Crescent Road

Visit the Chan Centre website for more information.

No Comments

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.