Contact: Stephanie Janes, (617) 598-3240, [email protected]
Celebrity Series of Boston
Gary Dunning, President and Executive Director
Presents
Takács Quartet
Bartók Cycle, Part 1
Edward Dusinberre, violin | Károly Schranz, violin |
Geraldine Walther, viola | András Fejér, cello
Thursday, March 20, 2014, 8pm — NEC’s Jordan Hall
(Boston) Celebrity Series of Boston will present the Takács Quartet: Bartók Cycle, Part 1 on Thursday, March 20, 2014, at 8:00pm at NEC’s Jordan Hall, 30 Gainsborough Street, Boston, MA. Sponsored by Gabor Garai, Hungarian Consul General and the Hungarian Society of Massachusetts.
Tickets for Takács Quartet start at $35, and are available online at www.celebrityseries.org, by calling CelebrityCharge at (617) 482-6661 Monday-Friday 10:00 a.m.- 4:00 p.m., or at the Jordan Hall Box Office, 30 Gainsborough Street, Boston, MA.
This is the Takács Quartet’s eighth appearance with the Celebrity Series of Boston, having performed most recently with pianist Marc-André Hamelin in 2012.
The Takács Quartet combines four distinct musical personalities to bring fresh insights to the string quartet repertoire. In 2012, Gramophone announced that the Takács was the only string quartet to be inducted into its first Hall of Fame. The ensemble also won the 2011 Award for Chamber Music and Song presented by the Royal Philharmonic Society in London. Appointed in 2012 as the first-ever Associate Artists at Wigmore Hall in London, the Takács will present six concerts per season there.
In 2013-2014, the Takács returns to Japan and Singapore, and will also perform Bartók Cycles throughout the U.S.
The Quartet’s award-winning recordings include the complete Beethoven Cycle on the Decca label. In 2005 the Late Beethoven Quartets won Disc of the Year and Chamber Award from BBC Music Magazine, a Gramophone Award and a Japanese Record Academy Award. Their recordings of the early and middle Beethoven quartets collected a Grammy, another Gramophone Award, a Chamber Music of America Award and two further awards from the Japanese Recording Academy. In 2006 the Takács Quartet made their first recording for Hyperion Records, of Schubert’s D804 and D810. A disc featuring Brahms’ Piano Quintet with Stephen Hough was released in November 2007 and was subsequently nominated for a Grammy. Brahms’ Quartets Op. 51 and Op. 67 were released in the fall of 2008 and a disc featuring the Schumann Piano Quintet with Marc-Andre Hamelin was released in late 2009. The complete Haydn “Apponyi” Quartets, Op. 71 and 74 were subsequently released, followed in 2012 by the Schubert Quintet CD with Ralph Kirshbaum. The three Britten Quartets were released in 2013. The Quartet has also made sixteen recordings for the Decca label since 1988, including Schubert’s Trout Quintet with pianist Andreas Haefliger, which was nominated in 2000 for a Grammy Award.
The quartet is known for innovative programming. In 2007 it performed, with Academy Award–winning actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, “Everyman” in Carnegie Hall, inspired by the Philip Roth novel. The group collaborates regularly with the Hungarian folk ensemble Muzsikas, performing a program that explores the folk sources of Bartók’s music. The Takács performed a music and poetry program with poet Robert Pinsky. In 2010 the Takács collaborated with the Colorado Shakespeare Festival and David Lawrence Morse on a drama project that explored the composition of Beethoven’s last quartets.
The Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest by Gabor Takács-Nagy, Károly Schranz, Gabor Ormai and András Fejér, while all four were students. It first received international attention in 1977, winning First Prize and the Critics’ Prize at the International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France. The Quartet also won the Gold Medal at the 1978 Portsmouth and Bordeaux Competitions and First Prizes at the Budapest International String Quartet Competition in 1978 and the Bratislava Competition in 1981. Violinist Edward Dusinberre joined the Quartet in 1993 and violist Roger Tapping in 1995. Violist Geraldine Walther replaced Mr. Tapping in 2005. In 2001 the Takács Quartet was awarded the Order of Merit of the Knight’s Cross of the Republic of Hungary, and in March of 2011 each member of the Quartet was awarded the Order of Merit Commander’s Cross by the President of the Republic of Hungary. The members of the Takács Quartet are Christoffersen Faculty Fellows at the University of Colorado Boulder.
Program:
Bartók: String Quartets 1, 3, and 5
** The Takács Quartet performs Bartók Cycle, Part 2: String Quartets 2, 4, and 6 on April 11, 2014
About Celebrity Series of Boston
Celebrity Series of Boston was founded in 1938 by pianist and impresario Aaron Richmond. Over the course of its 75-year history, Celebrity Series has presented an array of the world’s greatest performing artists, including Sergei Rachmaninoff, Arturo Toscanini, Ignace Paderewski, Artur Rubenstein, Vladimir Horowitz, Glenn Gould, Fritz Kreisler, Jascha Heifetz, Isaac Stern, Andrés Segovia, Kirsten Flagstad, Marian Anderson, Luciano Pavarotti, Béla Bartók, Igor Stravinsky, Martha Graham, Ballet Russe De Monte Carlo, Mikhail Baryshnikov, Mstislav Rostropovich, and the New York City Opera Company.
The Celebrity Series has been bringing the very best performers–from orchestras and chamber ensembles, vocal and piano music, to dance companies, jazz, and more–to Boston’s major concert halls for 75 years. The Celebrity Series of Boston believes in the power of excellence and innovation in the performing arts to enrich life experiences, transform lives and build better communities. Through its education initiatives, the Celebrity Series seeks to build a community of Greater Boston where the performing arts are a valued, lifelong, shared experience–on stages, in schools, at home– everywhere. For more information on Celebrity Series of Boston, call (617) 482-2595 or visit us online at www.celebrityseries.org.
The Celebrity Series of Boston, Inc. receives generous support from Amy and Joshua Boger; Eleanor and Frank Pao; Donna and Mike Egan; Susanne Marcus Collins Foundation; The Little Family Foundation; Tufts Health Plan; Foley & Lardner LLP; The John S. and Cynthia Reed Foundation; First Republic Bank; The Peabody Foundation; Charlesbank Capital Partners; PTC; Vertex Pharmaceuticals; The D.L. Saunders Real Estate Corp; Massachusetts Cultural Council; New England Foundation for the Arts.
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