Quatuor Arod
With Quatuor Arod, you are on the edge of your seat; this Parisian quartet plays with style and intensity. Following one of their concerts, the English newspaper The Guardian wrote of 'bold, almost chilling playing' and 'raw energy'. Things have moved fast since the quartet was founded in 2013. Arod has won first prize at major competitions every time. Their schedule lists concerts in the most beautiful venues, and their repertoire spans centuries. They rose to prominence as quartets with Haydn, and they open their concert in the Kleine Zaal—familiar territory for Quatuor Arod—with one of his finest string quartets.
Bartók, Carlos Simon and Fanny Mendelssohn
Throughout the centuries, artists have responded to the pressures of their time, although those pressures are always colored by personal experience. Fanny Mendelssohn was shocked by the sudden death of her brother, as well as by her family, who considered the publication of her work for a woman 'not done'. Bartók wrote his Fifth String Quartet amidst the turmoil of the 1930s, when fascism was gaining increasing ground in Germany and Austria. And composer-in-residence Carlos Simon drew inspiration from migration and uprooting in our current, dynamic world. Together, these works span two centuries of music in which composers make personal experiences audible in a unique way.