by Daniel Hathaway

“It’s like putting on all the Shakespeare plays in a month — it takes all your heart and soul and energy,” Cavani Quartet founder and primo violin Annie Fullard said in a recent telephone conversation about their “Beyond Beethoven” project.

But unlike Shakespeare, no blood was spilled, nobody got poisoned, and no kings were deposed during a three-month program that brought all sixteen of Beethoven’s string quartets — performed in tandem with works by eight living composers — to audiences in as many concerts and different venues around the metropolitan area, and involved working with four high school orchestra programs. “If I had to find one word to describe it, it’s been a lovefest,” Fullard said.

Fullard, a founding member of the Cavani Quartet, played for a decade with its original members, then for 25 years with the second generation of players. Her third time around is also her second time presenting the complete Beethoven cycle, now with three new musicians (she calls it “Cavani 2.0”)

The project will culminate in a Grand Finale on Tuesday evening, December 14 at 7:30 pm in Mandel Hall at Severance Music Center, when the Cavani — Annie Fullard and Catherine Cosbey, violins, Eric Wong, viola, and Kyle Price, cello — play Beethoven’s Opus 59, No. 3, followed by two premieres. [Read more…]