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This month we welcome two new ensembles: Tesla Quartet and the Mobius Trio, and explore the latest news from the River Project.  Read on and join us!
Ariel Artists
Tesla Quartet, Mobius Trio, The River Project and a cake for Akropolis
This month Ariel Artists is delighted to welcome two brilliant ensembles to our roster -- the TESLA QUARTET and MOBIUS TRIO.

We also offer a look at a fantastically creative collaboration, THE RIVER PROJECT, from composer Eve Beglarian and Guidonian Hand; celebrate Akropolis Reed Quintet's newest album; catch up with Blair McMillen, and more.

Adventures with friends both old and new.  Join us!
Tesla Quartet
Welcoming Tesla Quartet

It is our great pleasure to welcome the sterling Tesla Quartet to Ariel Artists.  

Winner of the Gold Medal at the 2012 Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition and Prizewinner in the 2012 Wigmore Hall London International String Quartet Competition and the 2013 Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition, the Tesla Quartet was formed at The Juilliard School in 2008 and has since established itself as a “technically superb” ensemble (The Strad) offering subtly colored performances "that balance[] confidently between intimacy and extraversion." (The London Evening Standard)

Their inherent talents and verve have been polished by their close work with the Takács Quartet, with whom they studied from 2009 to 2012 as the Graduate String Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Colorado-Boulder.

Listen to their performances of Bartók's String Quartet No. 4 and Haydn's String Quartet in C Major, Op. 20, No. 2, visit their website, and browse through the Ariel website's Tesla page to see their 14/15 program offerings and to learn more about this exemplary young ensemble. 

Welcome, Tesla!
 
Mobius Trio

Welcoming Mobius Trio

We are delighted to welcome the fantastically talented, wonderfully adventurous Mobius Trio to Ariel Artists. 

Described by the eminent Sergio Assad as “the most inventive and exciting young guitar ensemble today,” Mobius Trio aims to use the most popular, ubiquitous instrument in the world -- the guitar -- to create a new lexicon of music; one that freely combines the varied influences of musicians who grew up with unfettered access to the world’s entire musical library. 

To accomplish this, they collaborate with composers and other musicians -- 
including Samuel Carl Adams, Adrian Knight, Dan Becker, Nick Vasallo, and others -- to commission pieces that reflect this beautiful musical schizophrenia:  “classical,” punk, bebop, metal, folk, hardcore, and many other genres form the DNA of this music, in which the walls between genres cease to exist and old dichotomies start to unravel.  

Watch Mobius in action
performing the virtuosic neo-Persian stylings of Iranian composer Sahba Aminikia, one of the featured composers on their all-acoustic "San Francisco" program.

Now enjoy
a video premiere of Mobius communing with electric guitar feedback in a March 14, 2014 performance of Nick Vasallo's metal-influenced work, Dark Matter, at Cal Poly. (And check out the excellent coverage of this performance in this month's I Care If You Listen magazine.)

Visit their website, listen to other recent performances, and browse through their current offerings on their Ariel page to learn more about this charismatic young guitar trio. 

The River Project, with Guidonian Hand
Rolling along with The River Project

In the fall of 2009, composer Eve Beglarian embarked on a four-month-long journey down the entire Mississippi River by kayak and bicycle, immersing herself in local histories and the writings of those who had made similar journeys, including Mark Twain and Jonathan Raban. During her trip through the heart of the country, Eve kept a sonic journal about the people and places she encountered. These journal entries have evolved over the past several years into the River Project: a collection of original compositions, adventurous arrangements of river-related songs, as well as images, videos, and spoken-word readings, performed by the BRIM ensemble (Beglarian's duo with violinist Mary Rowell), Guidonian Hand trombone quartet, and Taylor Levine on guitars.

This February, the River Project was featured at California State University Fullerton's New Music Festival, where the performers appeared in masterclasses, composer forums, and two featured performances. 

"Everything about Beglarian's project is quietly idiosyncratic. BRIM itself is the duo of Beglarian as vocalist and reciter and manipulator of laptop-generated electronics, along with violinist Mary Rowell. The ensemble adds guitarist Gyan Riley and the Guidonian Hand trombone quartet.

Beglarian's suitably Mississippian music laps repetitively. The four trombones are a sheer joy of serenading foghorns. Rowell and Riley are exciting, creative musicians." -- Mark Swed, The Los Angeles Times, March 1, 2014

Watch video, listen to audio clips, and learn more about the River Project here

The Ariel Artists Staff
You have the Ariel Staff's sincere thanks for reading our newsletter!
 
Please be in touch with any questions, and let us know your thoughts.
 
A delicious Akropolis cake
Akropolis Reed Quintet celebrated the March 16 release of their newest album, Unraveled, with delicious cake and a concert in Ann Arbor, MI.

Learn more about the album here, and be sure to check out the Unraveled concert program; it's a tour offering in 15/16!
Yes, it's pianist Blair McMillen having fun with composer Joan Tower backstage at the Albany Symphony!  McMillen performed Tower's piece Still/Rapids with David Alan Miller and the ASO on March 1.  Rapids was written in 1996; Tower wrote Still specifically for McMillen last year; the ASO performances were the world premiere of the completed work.  

'"Still' was Debussy-an with atmospheric jazz harmonies and pastel colors drawing a blue sky, still lake, and pretty rippling arpeggios in the piano. 'Rapid,' which was written in 1996, was fast, loud and hard-edged with tone clusters, cascading lines, syncopated rhythms, and lots of very fast scales in the piano with both hands working closely together. McMillen nailed it all and the crowd cheered."
-
The Daily Gazette, March 4, 2014

 

The Ariel Array: 


-- The weirdly gorgeous Uncanny Valley project toured in March to the University of Virginia. A CD recording of this extravagantly lush concert-length work by John Gibson is forthcoming; stay tuned!


-- On April 7, Friction Quartet helps celebrate San Francisco Friends of Chamber Music's 15th anniversary with a gala performance at Yoshi's.


-- Violinist Francesca Anderegg performs a recital of works by Fauré, Mozart, and Stravinsky at Hamline University on April 24. 


-- Delphi Trio performs their program Schwanengesang – Trios from Late in Life, with works by Fauré, Schubert, Haydn, and Henry Cowell on April 25 for Sunset Concerts


-- Organist Rhonda Sider Edgington returns to her alma mater, Indiana University Bloomington, for a lecture/demonstration and a masterclass. 


-- Pianist Jenny Q Chai performed works by Schumann, Ligeti and Ryan Francis at the Shanghai Concert Hall on March 2.  (Check out some of the concert photos here.) 



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