Biography

Jonathan Ong  -  violin
Dorothy Ro  -  violin
Abigail Rojansky  -  viola
Jonathan Dormand  -  cello

with
Henry Kramer  -  piano

A string quartet for the 21st century, the Verona Quartet champions the rich breadth of the string quartet repertory from the time-honoured canon through contemporary classics. Known for its “bold interpretive strength, robust characterization and commanding resonance” (Calgary Herald), the Verona Quartet captivates audiences across four continents. As committed advocates of diverse programming, the Verona Quartet curated the UpClose Chamber Music Series. The Quartet currently serves as the Quartet-in-Residence at the Oberlin Conservatory, and at Nova Scotia’s Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance. The Verona Quartet’s rapid rise to international prominence was fueled by top prize wins at the Wigmore Hall, Melbourne, M-Prize, and Osaka International Chamber Music Competitions, as well as the 2015 Concert Artists Guild Competition. In 2020 the Quartet won Chamber Music America’s coveted 2020 Cleveland Quartet Award. The Verona Quartet’s second album, Shatter, debuted at No. 1 on the Billboard Traditional Classical Chart in July 2023. This disc showcases works written specifically for the Verona Quartet. Its most recent CD consists of the complete quartets of Ligeti. The Quartet’s name derives from a play by Shakespeare (Two Gentlemen of Verona), whose art of storytelling serves as the Verona Quartet’s inspiration. LMMC debut.

Pianist Henry Kramer joins the foursome in Schumann’s Piano Quintet. Kramer is developing a reputation as a musician of rare sensitivity. His insightful and exuberant interpretations won him the 2019 Avery Fisher Career Grant by Lincoln Center – one of the most coveted honours bestowed on young American soloists. 2nd LMMC appearance.

http://www.veronaquartet.com/

https://www.henrykramerpiano.com/

Notes

Three great composers wrote a great string quartet in A minor within just a few years of each other in the early nineteenth century: Beethoven (Op. 132), Schubert (No. 13, D. 804) and Mendelssohn. Beethoven’s and Schubert’s quartets are among their last compositions, but Mendelssohn’s is the work of a teenager. It is an astonishingly mature work for an 18-year-old. The powerful influence of Beethoven’s late quartets is everywhere: in the advanced harmonic language, the tightly knit counterpoint, the recitative passages, and the use of motivic fragments for developmental purposes. The spirit of Beethoven is nowhere more pronounced than in the adagio movement, with its soulful, hymnlike opening subject and aura of Innigkeit (inwardness).

In both quality and quantity, the fifteen string quartets of Dmitri Shostakovich stand as the only comparable body of such works written in the twentieth century that can be ranked with Beethoven’s. Shostakovich turned to this medium relatively late in his career, his first example appearing only in 1938 after he had composed the Fifth Symphony. No. 9 arrived in 1964. Its five movements, played without pause, are capped by a finale that lasts more than twice as long as any previous movement. Mordant wit, seething tension, and suppressed fury infuse the quartet. The pent-up tension is released in the furious finale, which storms on to a sustained fortississimo conclusion.

Schumann’s Piano Quintet is the first great work of its kind, uniting piano with the standard string quartet. This work did more to spread its composer’s reputation than any other single composition during his lifetime. As the piano was Schumann’s instrument, it is perhaps not surprising to learn that the keyboard is favored, to the extent that it assumes nearly equal importance alongside the other four instruments combined, essentially resulting in a “duet” for piano and a collective of four strings. A boldly striding theme for all five instruments in unison launches the quintet, while the second subject is one of Schumann’s most inspired flights of lyricism. The slow movement is marked to be played “in the manner of a march”  ̶  a funeral march, it would seem. In any case, it is certainly somber. The third movement has been called “the glorification of the scale,” for obvious reasons. The final movement, regarded by many listeners as the quintet’s finest, ends with a remarkable coda consisting of a double fugue built from overlapping entries of the principal themes of the first and last movements.

Robert Markow