DATE: April 23 2006, 3 PM

SITE: The Progress Energy (formerly BTI) Center for the Performing Arts   Map 

PROGRAM

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

The Miró Quartet is increasingly recognized as one of America's brightest and most exciting young chamber groups. Since winning First Prize at the 1998 Banff International String Quartet Competition and the prestigious Naumburg Chamber Music Award in 2000, the Miró Quartet has captivated audiences around the world, dazzling listeners with its youthful intensity and mature interpretations. Formed in the fall of 1995, the Quartet met with immediate success, winning the First Prize at the 50th annual Coleman Chamber Music Competition in April 1996, and the following month taking both the First and Grand prizes at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.

Their 2004-5 season includes engagements in Montreal, Chicago, San Diego, Berkeley, Washington, and many other cities. A highlight of the upcoming season takes place in February, 2005, when the Miró Quartet will perform with internationally-renowned guitarist Eliot Fisk at the music festival in Round Top, Texas.

Last year the Quartet was appointed Faculty String Quartet at The University of Texas at Austin. The members of the Miró Quartet - violinists Daniel Ching and Sandy Yamamoto, violist John Largess, and cellist Joshua Gindele - teach and coach chamber music there, while continuing their active international touring schedule. With this appointment, the University of Texas at Austin joined an elite group of institutions whose faculties include a world-class string quartet.

The Miró enjoys a busy international touring schedule and performs in some of the world's most recognized concert venues. The Quartet's 2003-4 included several tours in the United States, Canada and Europe, with performances at such prestigious venues as the Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, the Kammermusiksaal der Philharmonie in Berlin, the Konzerthaus in Vienna, and at the Dresdner Musikfestspiele in Dresden. Past seasons have taken the Quartet to Boston, New York City, Washington, and to several German cities. The Miró Quartet was Quartet-in-Residence at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center Two and was named to the Distinctive Debut Series of Carnegie Hall, which provided for a Weill Recital Hall performance as well as debut appearances in Cologne, Stockholm, Brussels, London, Vienna, Amsterdam and Athens. The ensemble made its Tokyo debut in 2001 in a concert benefiting the victims and families of the September 11th tragedy.

The Quartet has been heard on numerous national radio broadcasts, including those of National Public Radio's "Performance Today" and Minnesota Public Radio's "Saint Paul Sunday." Internationally, the Miró has been featured on radio networks across Europe, Israel and Canada. The Quartet has also been seen on NBC's "Today Show," ABC's "World News Tonight," and on various programs of the Canadian Broadcasting Company. At the invitation of Isaac Stern, the Quartet performed in a live broadcast at the Jerusalem Music Center in Israel and was featured in the recent American Masters Documentary "Isaac Stern: Life's Virtuoso."

The members of the Quartet maintain a strong dedication to the next generation of musicians and were on the faculty of the Hugh A. Glauser School of Music at Kent State University, where they taught private students and coached chamber music. The Miró has been the Resident String Quartet of Kent/Blossom Music - Kent State's annual summer chamber music festival, in cooperation with the Cleveland Orchestra. The Quartet members are collectively Artists-in-Residence at the Lake Tahoe Music Festival, its Academy now in its third summer. On short notice, the Quartet filled in for both Henry Meyer and Isaac Stern, leading master classes in Switzerland and Germany. In 2001, the Quartet teamed up with the Grand Canyon Music Festival and composer Brent Michael Davids to form the Native American Composers Apprentice Project, which teaches Native American students how to read and write music. The Miró Quartet also serves on the Advisory Council of Community MusicWorks of Providence, Rhode Island, an organization dedicated to enriching the lives of inner city youths and families through classical music.

The Quartet's unyielding commitment to contemporary music has led to the commission and performance of music by such composers as Leonardo Balada, Lee Hoiby, Brent Michael Davids, David Schober and Jonathan Dawe.

The Quartet has released two recordings on the Bridge Records label, performing music by Rued Langgaard and George Crumb. Its performance of Crumb's "Black Angels" on the second Bridge CD has received international acclaim, including the French "Diapason d'Or" distinction. The Miró's latest recording, released in March 2004 on the Oxingale label, has also been welcomed with enthusiastic reviews. On the CD, titled Epilogue, Miró performs Mendelssohn's final string quartet (Op. 80), and Schubert's Quintet in C with celebrated cellist Matt Haimovitz.

The Miró Quartet is named after the Spanish artist Joan Miró, whose surrealist works, with subject matter drawn from the realm of memory and imaginative fantasy, are some of the most original of the 20th century.

Artist Website: www.miroquartet.com