Jupiter String Quartet to Stream World Premiere

Jupiter String Quartet players Daniel McDonough, Meg Freivogel, Liz Freivogel, and Nelson Lee (from the event page for the concert being announced)

Readers may recall that the members of the Jupiter String Quartet, appointed as artists-in-residence and faculty members at the College of Fine & Applied Arts of the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne (UIUC) in 2012, streamed a month-long concert series entitled Reflection and Renewal from the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts at UIUC throughout the month of February. As has been previously observed, Jupiter is a “familial” ensemble. The violinists are Nelson Lee and Meg Freivogel. The violist is Liz Freivogel, Meg’s older sister; and the cellist is Daniel McDonough, Meg’s husband (making him Liz’s brother-in-law).

Next month the quartet will present a world premiere performance under the auspices of the Arizona Friends of Chamber Music (AFCM). AFCM commissioned Stephen Andrew Taylor to compose a new string quartet. The result is a single-movement composition entitled “Chaconne/Labyrinth.” The composer provided his own description of the music as follows:

“Chaconne” is an old-fashioned word for a repeating chord progression, like the 12-bar blues. Here the wonderful Jupiter Quartet plays a chaconne, but at the same time they are lost in a labyrinth. The chords keep returning, only to point in new directions. This is how I’ve felt the past year: stuck in a loop, but at the same time lost in a maze, desperately seeking the way out. At the center of this maze, like the Minotaur of Greek myth, lies a depiction of the coronavirus that has so profoundly changed our world. After this encounter—marked by strange, percussive sounds—the quartet traces their way, like following Ariadne’s thread, back through the labyrinth.

The program will also include a performance of Franz Schubert’s D. 810 string quartet in D minor, which was not published until three years after the composer’s death. It is probably best known for its second movement, which is a set of variations on a theme from Schubert’s D. 531 song, “Der Tod und das Mädchen” (Death and the maiden). As a result, it is frequently called the Death and the Maiden quartet.

The performance was recorded in the Smith Memorial Recital Hall on the UIUC campus. However, it will be streamed by AFCM. The recording will be available for streaming beginning at 9 a.m. (Pacific time) on Saturday, April 3. It will then be available for viewing for 30 days. Streaming will take place through the AFCM event page for this concert.