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Acclaimed String Quartet ETHEL Unveils Fall 2024 Highlights
ETHEL is set to release a new album Persist, which features new works for string quartet and flute.
By: Josh Sharpe Aug. 08, 2024
Hailed as a “relentlessly inventive string quartet setting the standard for new music engagement (San Diego Union-Tribune),” New York City’s ETHEL has announced its upcoming Fall 2024 activities centered around the release of its forthcoming album Persist on Sono Luminus Records (TBR 11.29.24).
A collaborative project with musical trailblazer Allison Loggins-Hull (Daniel R. Lewis Composer Fellow to the Cleveland Orchestra and newly appointed Resident Artistic Partner with New Jersey Symphony). Persist features new works for string quartet and flute. On September 24th, John Schaefer will host a preview concert of the album at Merkin Hall as part of his New Sounds LIVE Artist as Curator series. Other New York City concerts this season will include a Brooklyn Public Library presentation with Lebanese composer/violinist Layale Chaker playing tracks off of their latest album Vigil (2024); a Composers Concordance concert premiering works by emerging composers; ongoing weekend performances at The Metropolitan Museum of Art as the iconic institution’s long-time Ensemble-in-Residence, and more.
Elsewhere, ETHEL tours in the Southwest with GRAMMY® Award-winning Native American flutist Robert Mirabal. A 13-year friendship and collaboration, ETHEL and Mirabal continue to wow audiences in the latest installment from their long cross-cultural partnership, “The Red Willow.” This October 2024, ETHEL returns to Granville, Ohio, for its 11th year as Denison University’s Ensemble-in-Residence. For a complete schedule of ETHEL happenings, please scroll down or visit ETHELcentral.org.
Fall 2024 Season at a Glance (subject to change):
Friday-Saturday, September 13-14, 2024, at 6:00-8:30 p.m. Date Night at The Met!
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York
Tuesday, September 24, 2024, at 7:30 p.m. New Sounds LIVE Persist Album Preview Concert
Merkin Hall, New York City, New York
Co-presented with WNYC Radio’s New Sounds LIVE hosted by John Schaefer, this one-night only concert previews ETHEL’s forthcoming album Persist. Joining forces on stage with ETHEL is long-time collaborator/composer/flutist Allison Loggins-Hull. Together, they have elicited new commissioned works for string quartet and flute by four emerging composers: Migiwa “Miggy” Miyajima, Xavier Muzik, Sam Wu and 2022 Pulitzer Prize finalist Leilehua Lanzilotti.
Friday-Saturday, September 27-28, 2024, at 6:00-8:30 p.m. Date Night at The Met!
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City
Friday-Saturday, October 4-5, 2024, at 6:00-8:30 p.m. Date Night at The Met!
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York
Sunday, October 6, 2024, at 5:00 p.m. Composers Concordance Presents ETHEL
Church Street School, New York City, New York
The Composers Concordance presents ETHEL in an evening premiering new works by a handful of emerging composers including Svjetlana Bukvich, Dan Cooper, Alon Nechushtan, Gene Pritsker, and others TBA.
Tuesday-Thursday, October 10-14, 2024 The Red Willow Tour w/ Robert Mirabal
Thursday, October 10th Lensic Performing Arts Center, Santa Fe, New Mexico
Saturday, October 12th Lakewood Cultural Center, Lakewood, Colorado
Monday, October 14th The Lincoln Center, Fort Collins, Colorado
“The Red Willow” is a breathtaking, ambitious program of music and storytelling that explores the magnificence and rich history of northern New Mexico before extending the story worldwide. In honor of Mirabal’s Native American Taos community, ETHEL and Mirabal together offer a concert-meditation full of original music, movement, and wisdom, built around a work commissioned by Taos Chamber Music Society in the summer of 2023.
With their signature mastery, ETHEL and Mirabal refer to the local—the timeless magnificence of Taos—then explode it into the universal with a kaleidoscope of sounds that transcend geographical and temporal boundaries. Each member contributes their unique voice, and together, they weave a gorgeous tapestry with colors from Native America, Europe, Africa, and Asia. At the pinnacle of the program is the central work, Red Willow Suite, a breathtaking, ambitious piece of music and storytelling.
Monday-Saturday, October 21-26, 2024 Denison University Residency
Denison University, Granville, Ohio
Since 2014, ETHEL has served as Ensemble-in-Residence at Denison University, coaching and mentoring students in the music department as well as engaging campus and community in cross-disciplinary projects and performances. This year marks the 11th anniversary of ETHEL being embedded on campus and in the surrounding Granville community.
Friday-Saturday, November 1-2, 2024, at 6:00-8:30 p.m. Date Night at The Met!
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York
Saturday, November 2, 2024, at 3:30 p.m. Vigil in Concert w/ Layale Chaker
Brooklyn Public Library’s Dweck Cultural Center, Brooklyn, New York
In 2024, ETHEL continues its multi-year collaboration with the Brooklyn Public Library. This year, the library’s director of programs, Meredith Walters, will present “Vigil”, a collaborative concert with ETHEL and Lebanese-born, Brooklyn-based violinist Layale Chaker, showcasing the works of their highly acclaimed eponymous album, named after Chaker’s Vigil, written for the quintet.
Released in May 2024 on In A Circle Records, The Strad raved: “ETHEL manages a miraculous blend of vivid sonic storytelling with precision and passion, playing with a sense of deep conviction that makes Chaker’s music all the more powerful.”
Friday-Saturday, November 8-9, 2024, at 6:00-8:30 p.m. Date Night at The Met!
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City, New York
Friday, November 29, 2024 Album Release Persist featuring Allison Loggins-Hull
Persist (Sono Luminus) celebrates the courage, patience and resilience displayed by people in times of great difficulty, ETHEL joins forces with composer/flutist/producer Allison Loggins-Hull (Daniel R. Lewis Composer Fellow to the Cleveland Orchestra and newly appointed Resident Artistic Partner with New Jersey Symphony). Together, they elicited new commissions from four brilliant early-career composers: Migiwa “Miggy” Miyajima, Xavier Muzik, Sam Wu, and 2022 Pulitzer Prize finalist, Leilehua Lanzilotti. Loggins-Hull herself contributed her own masterwork to the project, the eponymous Persist.
About ETHEL
Established in New York City in 1998, string quartet ETHEL sets the contemporary concert standard: “indefatigable and eclectic” (The New York Times), “vital and brilliant” (The New Yorker). Composer performers—Ralph Farris (viola), Kip Jones (violin), Dorothy Lawson (cello), and Corin Lee (violin)—fuse uptown panache with downtown genre mashup. ETHEL has performed across the United States and worldwide; released 10 feature albums; guested on 50+ recordings; won a GRAMMY® with jazz legend Kurt Elling; and toured with Todd Rundgren & Joe Jackson. ETHEL champions the art and music of today, forging human connections across sound and style.
At the heart of ETHEL is a collaborative ethos — a quest for common creative expression, forged in listening and community. The quartet designs productions that inspire engagement, such as “The Red Willow,” featuring Taos Pueblo flutist Robert Mirabal, and “Signature Sessions,” a supercharged survey of the quartet’s 25+ years of inspired music-making.
ETHEL has premiered over 250 works, many of them commissioned by the quartet; ETHEL members have themselves been commissioned by The Ringling Museum of Art, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Georgia Tech, and the NEA. The quartet regularly performs music by such celebrated composers as Julia Wolfe, Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate, Jessie Montgomery, Andy Akiho, and Marcelo Zarvos.
Other collaborators include Bang on a Can All-Stars, Vijay Iyer, Stewart Copeland, Raven Chacon, David Byrne, Annie-B Parson, Gina Gibney, Grant McDonald, Steve Cosson, and Annie Dorsen.
ETHEL has been featured at TED Conferences; on ABC Radio Australia, SiriusXM, Conan O’Brien, John Schaefer’s New Sounds, Fred Child’s Performance Today, Randy Cohen’s Person Place Thing, NPR’s Weekend Edition; and on the soundtracks of Dan In Real Life and HBO’s Deadwood. From mid-2020 to early ‘22, ETHEL curated and produced Balcony Bar from Home, a virtual series hosted on The Metropolitan Museum’s Facebook page which has garnered nearly 2 million views.
ETHEL is Ensemble-in-Residence at Denison University, and Resident Ensemble at The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Balcony Bar in the Great Hall.
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