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Penn State College of Arts and Architecture
Center for the Performing Arts at Penn State

Event Slides Per Node 1415

  • Quartet members stand with their instruments

St. Lawrence String Quartet
Haydn Discovery

7:30 pm Wednesday, November 4, 2020

St. Lawrence String Quartet creates “a sound that has just about everything one wants from a quartet, most notably precision, warmth, and an electricity that conveys the excitement of playing whatever is on their stands at the moment,” writes a New York Times critic.

Now, the quartet has produced a special virtual program, Haydn Discovery, a unique exploration of one of Joseph Haydn’s seminal string quartets.

Center for the Performing Arts Director George Trudeau interviews acclaimed violinist Geoff Nuttall, co-founder of the ensemble, in an exclusive pre-concert discussion that illustrates the musical moments of Haydn’s String Quartet Op. 20, No. 3. Following the conversation, experience a performance of the Haydn quartet.

St. Lawrence has a long association with the Center for the Performing Arts, with five performances and residencies at Penn State dating to 1996. The ensemble is scheduled to perform in person at University Park in spring 2021.

“The St. Lawrence is first and foremost, I think, about risk taking,” writes a reviewer for Toronto’s The Globe and Mail, “about playing on the emotional edge; about performing, not to ‘get it right,’ but because the music has something to tell us that we cannot live without; something that could make you change your life.”  

The ensemble features violinists Nuttall and Owen Dalby, violist Lesley Robertson, and cellist Christopher Costanza. Founded in Toronto in 1989, the quartet has been ensemble-in-residence at Stanford University since 1998. At Stanford, the quartet directs the chamber music program and often collaborates with other departments at the university, including the schools of Law, Medicine, Business, and Education.

 

Watch the event beginning at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, November 4. It will be available for streaming through 7:30 p.m. Thursday, November 12.

FREE

How to Watch

The performance will be streamed on this page for free. When streaming becomes available, a "Watch" button will appear.

 

2020 Up Close and Virtual season sponsors

Geisinger
Northwest

Contributions from the members of the Center for the Performing Arts and a grant from the University Park Student Fee Board help make this program free of charge.

Additional support provided by the Nina C. Brown Endowment.

Help us continue to provide free streaming programs with a donation of $5 or more. Or join as a member starting at $60 and receive benefits.

 

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