Pro Musica: Jasper String Quartet

Based in Philadelphia, the dynamic Jasper String Quartet is the Professional Quartet in Residence at Temple University’s Center for Gifted Young Musicians. Formed in 2006, they swept the competition circuit, winning major awards such as the Grand Prize in the Plowman Chamber Music Competition and Yale School of Music’s Horatio Parker Memorial Prize. The Quartet are dedicated to community outreach, receiving numerous grants and recognition —including a 2012 Chamber Music America Grant—for their “imaginative and outstanding” work with the musical youth of Philadelphia, as well as the prestigious Cleveland Quartet Award.  The Jasper’s raison d’etre is performing emotionally significant music and commissioning work from some of the most talented and important contemporary composers. The New York Times named their recent album, Unbound,as one of the 25 Best Classical Recordings of 2017.

Friday’s concert features Haydn’s Quartet in B-flat Major, the “Sunrise”. Light and airy, the elegant melody showcases his compositional virtuosity, structure and integrity of feeling with vigorous rhythms and an energetic finale. Next, Czech composer Bedřich Smetana’s autobiographical String Quartet No.1, “From My Life”. The piece takes the listener on an emotional journey through his romantic ideals, from happy memories of youth to great emotional depth in the last movement, where he expresses his search for the true essence of art.

We will also hear Mendelssohn’s Quartet in D Major, composed in 1838 and dedicated to the Crown Prince of Sweden. The composer’s favorite its opening energetic and soaring violin gives way to the fierce staccato rhythm in the last. Cherished for its unusual passion, the piece is filled with light and joy.

Saturday’s concert begins with Haydn’s Quartet No. 4 in D Major. Known as the “father of the string quartet”, he developed compositional techniques that defined the medium for over 200 years. This quartet has a mysterious and dramatic opening followed by harmonic surprises throughout. The beauty of the piece shows Hayden’s mature quartet style and is always an audience favorite.

We will also hear Debussy’s String Quartet in G minor. A pioneer of  modern chamber music, Debussy freed the form from its rigid structure and introduced more emotion and sensation. From its soaring opening it surprises with its dissonant, playful, and unconventional approach. This was his first important string quartet and one can trace the style of his later work back to this innovative composition.

Finally the piece de resistance of the concert; Schubert’s Quartet in D Minor, “Death and the Maiden”. It is a pillar of the chamber music repertoire with it stunning intensity, written as the composer faced death. Despite its somber opening, the work has an aggressive and hypnotic power and Schubert uses his signature rhythmic devices to imbue this stunning masterpiece with life and energy as it rushes toward a breathless finale.

Tickets for the concerts at St. Paul’s are $200, $350 and $450 pesos donation each, and are on sale at the Bookshop in the Biblioteca Pública; through our website with no booking fee, and at the concert 45 minutes before performance time.

Details of all Pro Musica’s concerts and Patron Membership are on our website, www.promusicasma.org, or contact us at promusicasma@aol.com.

Sincerely, Michael Pearl, President, Pro Musica