The Arianna String Quartet (ASQ) recently returned from a month-long tour performing and teaching in South Africa. That experience is reflected in the opening concert of the quartet’s 2013-14 season on September 6. Titled “Out of Africa,” the concert is highlighted by Five Elegies by South African composer Arnold van Wyk. The program also includes Mendelssohn’s Quartet in F minor, Op. 80 and Schubert’s Death and the Maiden.
During their stay in South Africa, the members of the ASQ helped revive a chamber music program at the University of the Western Cape. They gave a number of high-profile performances and also spent a bit of time enjoying the beauty of the Cape Town region.
The members of the ASQ - violinists John McGrosso and Julia Sakharova, violist Joanna Mendoza and cellist Kurt Baldwin – are faculty members of the University of Missouri – St. Louis. The quartet is also the Ensemble-in-Residence at the university’s Touhill Performing Arts Center where the ASQ’s concert series is performed.
The ASQ’s season continues with “An Evening with Johannes Brahms, the Three Piano Quartets” with pianist Timothy Hester on November 8 and “A Night at the Opera” with soprano Stella Markou on March 7, 2014, and concludes with “High Five” with cellist Zuill Bailey on May 9, 2014.
In addition to the concert series at the Touhill, the quartet has started a new series of performances and discussions in the UMSL at Grand Center building's Community Room. Titled "First Mondays With the ASQ," the series continues at 7:30 p.m. on October 7, November 4, March 3, April 7 and May 5. Audience members get a behind the scenes look into the craft of the performance and the opportunity to directly interact with the musicians.
ASQ members John McGrosso and Joanna Mendoza were Steve Potter’s guests on “Cityscape” to talk about their experiences in South Africa, their opening concert and their two series.
Related Event
Arianna String Quartet Presents "Out of Africa"
Friday, September 6, 2013
8:00 p.m.
Touhill Performing Arts Center's Lee Theater on the UMSL campus
(314) 516-4949
Touhill Performing Arts Center Website
Cityscape is produced by Mary Edwards and Alex Heuer, hosted by Steve Potter and funded in part by the the Arts and Education Council of Greater St. Louis, the Regional Arts Commission and the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency.
