Highlights

THE ARDITTI QUARTET

HIGHLIGHTS

The quartet begins 2012 with a return to Cité de la Musique in Paris for the 5th String Quartet Biennale where the music of Rihm will be featured. The quartet will perform on 19th, 20th and 21st January, giving first the world premiere of Rihm's 13th quartet, a commission from Le Cité, followed by the 3rd and 5th quartets in the following concerts.

 
The quartet will immediately return to London for composer workshop’s at Senate House, sponsored by the Institute of Musical Research. Two composers will be selected to be performed in a concert at St Gilles Cripplegate on 25th January, where Harvey’s 2nd quartet, the London premiere of Rihm’s 13th quartet and a new work by Paul Archbold can be heard. The following day, there will be an open workshop and performance of Harvey’s 4th quartet with electronics at LSO St Lukes.
 
On the 2nd and 3rd February, there will be two concert’s in Amsterdam and Utrecht where Dusapin's Hinterland for quartet and Orchestra will be played with the Hilversum Radio Chamber Philharmonic under Jonathan Stockhammer.

Further concerts take place in February, on 7th in Cologne, where the German premiere of Rihm’s 13th quartet can be heard alongside music by Berg, Dillon and Xenakis. In Madrid on 14th February, the new Rihm quartet is also played, with the premiere of Tomas Marco’s 6th quartet and music by Berg and Manoury.

For the first week of March, the quartet is in residence for Musique en Scene in Lyon. On 1st March, they will play Staud’s Dichtomie II for quartet and orchestra, with the Orchestre National de Lyon under Pascal Rophe. On 6th March there will be a quartet concert, where the premiere of Francesca Verunelli’s Unfolding for quartet and live electronics is played. This is a work prepared at IRCAM in Paris. Quartet’s by Ades, Jarrell and Staud can also be heard.
 
On 20th March, the quartet returns to the Maerzmusik festival in Berlin. The concert will feature Cage and include his Music for 4. The rest of the programme will contain music by Terry Jennings, La Monte Young, Alvin Lucier and Stefano Scodanibbio.

The Quartet return to the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam, on 30th March where a programme of music by Beethoven, Lachenmann, Ligeti and Manoury can be heard.
The Quartet will play in Karlsruhe on 2nd April a programme to celebrate Rihm’s 60th birthday year which includes his 5th and 13th quartet alongside music by Berg and Stravinsky.

The Quartet have a short trip to the US in April where they will perform in Washington in the Library of Congress on 10th and in San Francisco at Herbst Hall on 12th. The programme will include Tom Ades’s most recent quartet, The Four Quarters alongside music by Bartok, Beethoven and Berg.
The quartet returns to the South Bank in London on 22nd April to participate in their festival on the music of Nancarrow. Both of Nancarrow’s quartets can be heard, as well as Paul Usher’s arrangement of Player-Piano Study No.33. Ligeti’s 2nd quartet will also be included.
The Wittener Tage for new music yet again plays host to the quartet on 28th and 29th April where new quartets by Hans Abrahamsen and Naomi Pinnock are played. The quartet will also continue an octet or double string quartet project with their colleagues in the Jack quartet. New pieces by James Clarke and Mauro Lanza will be performed.
The quartet will take part in Cologne, in a large scale piece by Brice Pauset, Dornröschen II, scored for quartet, choir and orchestra. The concert will take place on 25th May with WDR Sinfonie Orchester and Matthias Pintscher.
The quartet returns to the Agora Festival in Paris on June 10th for a second performance of Verunelli’s Unfolding, premiere in March in Lyon. The programme will also include quartets by Ferneyhough and Manoury.
On 16th June, there will be a concert for the KunstFestSpiele in Hanover. The programme will include the quartet music by Nancarrow and Thomas Kessler’s NGH WHT with Saul Williams as speaker.
On 17th June the quartet will perform Lachenmann’s 3 quartets at the Aldeburgh festival.
For the last two weeks of June, the quartet will reside in Paris where they will take part in the Acanthe course. This course has for the last years been held in Metz but has now moved to Paris. The Arditti quartet will coach young players in the performance of contemporary music and work with young composers on new pieces with electronics that will be performed in a concert at Ircam on 30th June. The course opens also with a concert at Ircam on 22nd June with music by Ades, Harvey, Kurtag and the premiere of a new work by Giovanni Bertelli.
The quartet will work with 5 selected composers on a course in Edenkoben, Germany in the second week of July. These are, Patricia Alessandrini, Steven Daverson, Andrew Greenwald, Samy Moussa and Evis Sammoutis. Brian Ferneyhough will also be assisting the quartet for this project. On 14th July, there will be a concert of these 5 new works in Herrenhaus Edenkoben and the following day, the same programme will be performed in Darmstadt at the Summer course’s for new music.

On 25thJuly, the quartet will perform in Copenhagen at the Oremandsgaard Kammermusikfest, playing the recent 4th quartet by Abrahamsen premiered in Witten, as well as music by Ravel, Stravinsky and Takemitsu.

After the summer break, the quartet plays in San Sebastian on 1st September. The programme will include a new work by Gabriel Erkoreka and music by Bertrand, Dufourt, Halffter and Manoury.
In September the quartet have an extensive tour of Japan, about which more details will follow.

The link for Kingston University's film on Ferneyhough's 6th quartet is the following:
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/itunes-u/arditti-quartet/id441504831
The various films available free include a performance of the work, rehearsals with the composer and comments by Ferneyhough and Arditti on the work.