Kantos Quartet

Thursday 17th September, 8pm

Sarah Sew – violin

Hugh Murray – violin
Alexandros Koustas – viola

Aoife Burke – cello

Beethoven – String Quartet in B flat Op.18 No.6 [1800]

Caroline Shaw – Blueprint [2016]

Swan Hennessy – String Quartet No.2 [1920]

Janáček – String Quartet No.1 Kreutzer Sonata [1924]

This is the debut tour of an exciting new quartet comprising four of our finest and most experienced musicians. Their programme looks both to music and events of the 1920s and to the upcoming bi-centenary of Beethoven’s death in 1827.

Beethoven’s early B flat quartet moves from a brilliant and uplifting opening movement, through a gentle adagio and a wildly irregular scherzo, to the heart of the piece, a moving slow introduction to the finale which Beethoven entitled La Malinconia. The finale itself is curously enigmatic, as if unsure how to react to the pathos of its opening.

Pulitzer prize winning composer Caroline Shaw took this Beethoven quartet as the blueprint of her 2016 quartet of that name and its transformation is both fascinating and entertaining.

The story behind Irish-American composer Swan Hennessy’s beautiful second string quartet is outlined on RTE’s Century Ireland website. Written in memory of Terence MacSwiney, shortly after his death on hunger strike in 1920, the piece was premiered by four Dublin-based musicians at the World Congress of the Irish Race in Paris on the evening of 25 January 1922. The audience included Éamon de Valera, Countess Markievicz and Mary MacSwiney (sister of Terence).

Leoš Janáček’s first string quartet Kreutzer Sonata is one of the most searing and psychologically charged works in the quartet repertoire. Written in 1923 and inspired by Tolstoy’s novella of the same name, the music is raw, fragmented and intensely direct. Sudden contrasts, speech‑like motifs and restless rhythmic energy create a compelling sense of theatrical drama.

Tickets: €20 / €18 (+booking fee)

Kantos Quartet