Friday, October 7, 2022

Tertulia to Host Next Telegraph Quartet Recital

For those unfamiliar with the name, Tertulia is the latest organization to take an innovative approach to cultivating an audience for concerts. The strategy is to present those concerts in restaurants, providing an atmosphere that combines lively conversation and dining with the opportunity to listen to music in performance, rather than through recordings piped through intrusive loudspeakers. The plan is for a “dinner-concert” at which two performances are separated by extended intermissions, the latter providing the time for restaurant service and conversation.

The Telegraph Quartet (violinists Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violist Pei-Ling Lin, and cellist Jeremiah Shaw) will provide music for a Tertulia event later this month. They have selected for performance two string quartets, both from the early years of the two halves of the twentieth century. The more familiar of these will be the four-movement string quartet by Maurice Ravel, which he completed in 1903 and dedicated to Gabriel Fauré. The later selection will be the fourth of the seven string quartets by the Polish composer Grażyna Bacewicz. She composed this three-movement quartet in 1951, and some have taken the quartet to be a reflection on surviving the Nazi occupation of Warsaw.

The building where the Town Hall restaurant is located (from a Web page created by Plan B Engineering)

Tertulia will host this event in the Town Hall restaurant, which is located in SoMa at 342 Howard Street. This is a historic four-story structure, formerly the home of the Marine Electric Company (Meco). The dinner-concert will begin at 6 p.m. on Friday, October 21; and the entire evening of food and music will last for about four hours. The plan for the full event will be as follows:

  • Cocktails and amuse-bouche
  • Telegraph performs the Bacewicz quartet
  • Dinner
  • Telegraph performs the Ravel quartet
  • Dessert

The price of a ticket for front row dinner seating is $160 with a service fee of $5.09. The price for table seating for dinner is $125 (service fee $4.04); and the price for those having dinner at the bar will be $110 (service fee $3.59). There will also be concert-only general admission tickets sold for $35 with a service fee of $1.35. Students may attend the concert at no charge. All tickets may be purchased online through the Tertulia event page.

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