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The music of Hochelaga, Land of Souls: a conversation with composer Gyan Riley

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by Mike Telin

François Girard’s latest film, Hochelaga, Terre des âmes (“Hochelaga, Land of Souls”), is a historical drama that investigates and dramatizes the long struggle for the land that became Montréal. Like all of the French-Canadian director and screenwriter’s work, which includes Thirty Two Short Films About Glenn Gould and The Red Violin, a great deal of attention has been placed on the musical score — here Girard has turned to the father and son team of Terry Riley and Gyan Riley.

Hochelaga, Land of Souls, which will be screened at the Cleveland Museum of Art on Friday, March 1 at 7:00 pm, features performances by the Kronos Quartet and violinist Tracy Silverman.

[Read more…]

Review: Kronos Quartet at Cleveland Museum of Art (January 18)

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by Daniel Hathaway

“Eclectic”Kronos-Quartet doesn’t begin to describe the musical tastes of the Kronos Quartet. “Omniludic” (we just made that up) would be more like it. Musical omnivores, the Kronos are ready and eager to play music of any genre, and violinists David Harrington and John Sherba and cellist Jeffrey Zeigler have the technical and stylistic chops to do that — and to moonlight on a few other instruments too.

In their wide-ranging program in Gartner Auditorium of the Cleveland Museum of Art on January 18, the Kronos Quartet offered compelling performances of works by Bryce Dessner, Ram Narayan, Dan Becker (a first performance), Laurie Anderson, Steve Reich, Omar Souleyman and Aleksandra Vrebalov, plus arrangements of Vietnamese and Swedish tunes, to a large and rapt audience. [Read more…]

Preview: CMA VIVA! & Gala: a conversation with David Harrington of the Kronos Quartet

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by Mike Telin

ForKronos-Quartet nearly forty years, the Kronos Quartet — David Harrington and John Sherba violins, Hank Dutt, viola and Jeffrey Zeigler, cello — have been a potent force in the advancement of contemporary classical music. On Friday, January 18 beginning at 7:30 this celebrated quartet returns to Cleveland for a concert on the VIVA! & Gala series in the Cleveland Museum of Art’s Gartner Auditorium.

In the words of David Harrington, “I’ve always wanted the string quartet to be vital, and energetic, and alive, and cool, and not afraid to kick ass and be absolutely beautiful and ugly if it has to be. But it has to be expressive of life. To tell the story with grace and humor and depth. And to tell the whole story, if possible.” Now, with over 750 works written for Kronos Quartet by an impressive list of composers, how does a quartet with so many repertoire possibilities go about programming a concert?  [Read more…]

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