Cassatt String Quartet To Perform With Guitarist Elliot Fisk In Boston GuitarFest Gala Concert

The acclaimed Cassatt String Quartet will join co-founder and artistic director of Boston GuitarFest, American classical guitarist Elliot Fisk at a live gala concert of the 17th Boston GuitarFest. The event, which will also be streamed, will take place at Jordan Hall at the New England Conservatory (30 Gainsborough St, Boston, MA 02115) in Boston Massachusetts, on Saturday, June 25, 2022, at 8:00 PM, EDT.

Titled "Toward the Light," the concert will feature a world premiere of Daniel Strong Godfrey's quintet for guitar and string quartet, and works by Turina, Granados, and Boccherini. An open dress rehearsal with the Cassatts and Mr. Fisk will also take place at the Jordan Hall Fisk at 5 PM EDT. The Cassatt String Quartet will appear in the formation of first violinist Muneko Otani, second violinist Jennifer Leshnower, violist Ah Ling Neu, and cellist Gwen Krosnick. The full program follows:

Joaquín Turina La Oración del Torero (for string quartet)

Enrique Granados Danza Española # 5 "Andaluza"**

Enrique Granados Danza Española # 10 "Danza Triste"**

Isaac Albéniz Torre Bermeja**

Ernesto Halffter Habanera **

Isaac Albéniz Sevilla**

Luigi Boccherini Guitar Quintet in D, G. 448

I. Pastorale

II. Allegro Maestoso

III. Grave assai

IV. Fandango

Intermission

Daniel S. Godfrey Toward Light: Quintet for Guitar and String Quartet*

II. Dusk: Prayer

III. Midnight: Danse

IV. Before Dawn: Cadenza

V. Daybreak: Running toward Light

*World premiere

** Solo guitar, trans. For guitar by E.Fisk

General admission of $40 for the gala concert can be purchased at the event website: https://bostonguitarfest.org/product/concert-tickets-toward-the-light-gala-concert/. All audience members are expected to send in either 1) proof of vaccination (three shots / boosted) or 2) negative test result (antigen within 24 hours or PCR within 72 hours) in advance. For more information, please visit Boston Guitar Fest's website: https://bostonguitarfest.org/, and Cassatt String Quartet's website: http://www.cassattquartet.com/.

Guitarist Eliot Fisk is known worldwide as a charismatic performer famed for his adventurous and virtuosic repertoire.

Having performed as soloist with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Houston Symphony, Rochester Symphony, Orchestra of St. Lukes, Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, Pro Arte Orchestra, American Composers Orchestra, Boston Modern Orchestra Project (BMOP), and many others, he returns regularly to major concert series such as Stanford Lively Arts, Spivey Hall (Atlanta), Duke University Performances, Newman Center for the Performing Arts in Denver; Lincoln Center, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the 92nd Street Y in NYC, Da Camera Society of Houston, Da Camera Society of Los Angeles, San Francisco Chamber Music; Segovia Series at Pick-Staiger Hall at Northwestern University; Jordan Hall, Boston; Orange County Performing Arts Center; Brahms, Mozart and Schubert Saal (Vienna); Mozarteum Grosser Saal (Salzburg); Wigmore Hall and Queen Elizabeth Hall (London) and at numerous guitar festivals such as those of Cordoba, Spain; Belgrade, Serbia; and Iserlohn, Bad Aibling and Hersbrueck, Germany.

He has collaborated with numerous chamber music colleagues including flutist, Paula Robison; clarinetist, Richard Stoltzman; cellist Yehuda Hanani; violinists Ruggiero Ricci, Gidon Kremer, and Joshua Bell, the Shanghai, Juilliard, Miro, Borromeo, and Arditti String Quartets.

The repertoire of the classical guitar has been transformed through Fisk's innumerable transcriptions (including works by Bach, Scarlatti, Haydn, Mozart, Paganini, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Granados, Albeniz and many others). In addition, numerous new works have been dedicated to him by composers as varied as Leonardo Balada, Robert Beaser, Luciano Berio, Ralf Gawlick, Nicholas Maw, George Rochberg, Daniel Bernard Roumain and Kurt Schwertsik.

Eliot Fisk is Founder and Artistic Director of Boston GuitarFest (www.bostonguitarfest.org) an annual cross-disciplinary event co- sponsored by the New England Conservatory and Northeastern University and now entering its 13th consecutive year. In 2017 he created and served as Artistic Director of the first ever and immensely successful Salzburg Guitar Fest at the Universität Mozarteum in Salzburg.

Hailed for their "mighty rapport and relentless commitment" (Jay Harvey Upstage, 2021), the New York City-based Cassatt String Quartet has performed throughout the world, with appearances at Alice Tully Hall and Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall; Tanglewood Music Center; the Kennedy Center; Théâtre des Champs-Élysées; Centro National de las Artes; Maeda Hall; and Beijing Central Conservatory. At the Library of Congress, the Cassatts performed on the Library's matched quartet of Stradivarius instruments.

The Cassatt's upcoming projects include premiere performances and recordings of works by Daniel S. Godfrey, Dylan Schneider, Gerald Cohen, and Shirish Korde; collaborations with Ursula Oppens, Eliot Fisk, Oskar Espina Ruíz, Colin Williams, and Narek Arutyunian; their annual residencies in Texas and Maine; hometown concerts in the New York City area; and appearances at Music Mountain, Treetops Chamber Music Society, Maverick Concerts, and Jordan Hall.

Alex Ross has named the Cassatt Quartet's work three times in his "10 Best Classical Recordings" roundup in The New Yorker Magazine. The group's prolific discography of over forty recordings includes new quartets by Steven Stucky, Daniel S. Godfrey, Sebastian Currier, and Samuel Adler. They have recorded for the Koch, Naxos, New World, Point, CRI, Tzadik, and Albany labels.

The quartet has been featured on NPR's "Performance Today," WGBH Boston, WQXR and WNYC of New York, Canada's CBC Radio, and Radio France. They have appeared in numerous virtual concert series and performances across online platforms.

Formed in 1985 with the encouragement of the Juilliard Quartet, the Cassatt String Quartet served as the inaugural participants in Juilliard's Graduate String Quartet Residency. They have received major awards from the National Endowment for the Arts, the USArtists International, Chamber Music America, CMA/ASCAP, Banff International String Quartet Competition, Fischoff and Coleman Chamber Music Association, the Mary Flagler Cary Charitable Trust, Meet the Composer, and the Amphion, Copland, Fromm and Alice M. Ditson Music Foundations. Since 1995, the ensemble has been on the performing artist roster for the New York State Council on the Arts.

The CSQ has played nationally and internationally to critical acclaim. The New York Times praised their "bold and probing account" of Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 8 (Anthony Tommasini, 2015). Concerto Net wrote: "Wherever one encounters the Cassatt Quartet...one is astonished both at their prowess and their unfailing inspiration" (2018). SoundWordSight praised their "wonderful performance, with a beautifully integrated sound" (Jeffrey James, 2017); and Jay Harvey said their "performance's rapturous reception by the large audience was both predictable and well-deserved" (Jay Harvey Upstage, 2021).

The Cassatt Quartet is deeply committed to nurturing young musicians, and has given classes for composers and performers at the American Academy in Rome; the Toho School in Tokyo; the Bowdoin International Music Festival; Columbia, Cornell, Princeton and Syracuse Universities; and the University of Pennsylvania. Since 1995, the CSQ has been in residence at the Seal Bay Festival of Contemporary American Chamber Music in Maine; and, since 2005, at Cassatt in the Basin!, an annual educational residency in Odessa, Texas.

The Cassatt Quartet is noted for its brilliance in both contemporary and traditional repertoire, and has collaborated with members of the Tokyo, Cleveland and Vermeer Quartets; pianists Ursula Oppens and Marc-André Hamelin; clarinetist David Shifrin, flutist Ransom Wilson, jazz pianist Fred Hersch, and didgeridoo player Simon 7; the Trisha Brown Dance Company; and composers Louis Andriessen, Kaija Saariaho, Joan Tower, John Corigliano, Tania León, Shulamit Ran, and Augusta Read Thomas.

Named for the Impressionist painter Mary Cassatt, the quartet consists of violinists Muneko Otani and Jennifer Leshnower; cellist Gwen Krosnick, and violist Rosemary Nelis. Ah Ling Neu will serve as violist for this concert.

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