A performance by the Calder Quartet during the celebration of the fortieth anniversary of the Avery Fisher Arts Program at Lincoln Center. Watch video here.

...these performers expertly drew together folk and high art, western and eastern European identity, and especially respect for tradition with the pioneering spirit of modernism.Download PDF | Full Article

The Los Angeles Master Chorale ended its 50th season Sunday night at Walt Disney Concert Hall with the premiere of three new works commissioned for the occasion and two other recent Chorale commissions...Download PDF | Full Article

...The Juilliard String Quartet makes its first appearance since 2005, having replaced two members in the interim; they’ll play music of Webern, Berg, and Schubert (Oct. 18). Also appearing in a new configuration is the Emerson String Quartet, with a program that includes a new piece by Lowell Liebermann, a Celebrity Series co-commission (Jan. 22). The Calder Quartet brings one of its specialties — Thomas Adès’s “Arcadiana” — and a local premiere by Andrew Norman to Jordan Hall on Feb. 20...Download PDF | Full Article

Reich's "Different Trains," the composer's autobiographical string quartet accompanied by recorded voices of train conductors from his boyhood of shuttling between the East Coast and the West at the same time other Jewish boys on trains in Europe were headed to a horrifically dissimilar fate. It was played by the Calder Quartet with an engrossingly rich tone and rhythmic acuity that revealed what may be an overlooked Minimalist root in the Eastern European folk-inspired music of Bartók and Janácek.Download PDF | Full Article

The Oberlin Conservatory of Music is pleased to announce that the Calder Quartet has been named quartet in residence for the 2014-2016 academic years.Called “superb” by the New York Times and “one of America’s great string quartets” by the Los Angeles Times," the quartet has also just been awarded the 2014 Avery Fisher Career Grant...Download PDF | Full Article

As a classical-music ensemble with a sterling critical reputation and a flair for the contemporary, the Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet is used to playing at some of  the most prestigious concert venues around the world.On a recent winter morning, however, the musicians were in a modest studio in a not-so-glamorous stretch of Glendale dominated by shabby industrial warehouses. Passing freight trains emitted a repetitive ka-chink as they moved through the area on rusty tracks.Inside, a rhythm of a different sort was at play. The quartet was recording (and re-recording… and re-recording) a staccato passage for the soundtrack of the Starz drama series “Da Vinci’s Demons.”Download PDF | Full Article

The Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet and the Belgian violist Dimitri Murrath have each been named as recipients of Avery Fisher Career Grants for 2014.Download PDF | Full Article

Beyond the bold athleticism of the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Co. performance last October, there was one additional wonder that night — the fact that the soundtrack was no soundtrack at all. The evening’s live string players included the Los Angeles–based Calder Quartet, four men who bonded during their time at USC and 15 years hence have charted an impressive and adventurous résumé. By all indications, Calder appears to be the representative quartet for the 21st century; they’re young, flexible, open-minded, deeply dedicated to the tradition, and irresistibly drawn to the new...Download PDF | Full Article

Anne-Marie McDermott, Calder Quartet, "Mozart: Piano Concertos K. 414, 415, 449" (Bridge): Mozart was a practical fellow, suggesting that these orchestral pieces might easily be performed as chamber works, with just pianist and string quartet. And here they are in their rarely heard chamber versions. These intimate performances are evocative: One feels the play of shadow and light, the gladness, the sense of wistfulness and loss, like an afternoon of sweet rain.Download PDF | Full Article

...Cheng, another previous Grammy winner, is, like Josefowicz, nominated for best classical instrumental solo. The pianist’s recording, “The Edge of Light,” features appropriately luminous solo performances of works by Messiaen and Kaija Saariaho. Los Angeles’ Calder Quartet makes an appearance as well in piano quintet pieces by both composers...Download PDF | Full Article

...the Calder players took a fresh, modern look at the work, paring away much of the voluptuous swooning and turning in a refreshingly clear-eyed — but no less powerful — account.Download PDF | Full Article

...The Calder Quartet performed No. 3 and No. 4 with flair, its lean, tightly wrought sound and impeccable ensemble work illuminating the intricacies and enduring strangeness of the pieces...Download PDF | Full Article

...This is a glimpse into the care and musicality the group displays. The Calder Quartet towers above every other string quartet this reviewer heard this year (or any other year)...Download PDF | Full Article

Review of Mozart Piano Concerti with Anne-Marie McDermmott.'..an otherworldly example of superb Mozart-playing..'Download PDF

...In the past several years, the Calder Quartet, four Californians in their early thirties, have matured from energetic upstarts to a first-rate ensemble...[Illustration by Jon Han.]Download PDF | Full Article

The constituent parts of Dirty Projectors have been staying busy on their own of late. Amber Coffman, of course, is the bewitching voice on Major Lazer's still-excellent "Get Free." We saw Olga Bell play dress-up and take the lead in the video for Nothankyou's "Oyster." And Nat Baldwin also recently shared shared some solo material of his own — the collection Dome Branches which included "Look She Said" featuring DPs mastermind David Longstreth. Now, Pitchfork reports that Longstreth will be appearing at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art on November 1.While he won't be accompanied by his band, the man will hardly be alone. The Calder Quartet, who've accompanied everyone from the National to Airborne Toxic Event to Vampire Weekend, will join Longstreth as part of the Bartók Quartet Cycle series. The group is set to perform the music of Béla Bartók, plus new original work and new takes on Dirty Projectors favorites rearranged by Longstreth. The DPs boss has been known for his liberal interpretations of others' songs in the past (i.e. Black Flag via Rise Above), so expect the pleasantly unexpected.Full Article

On November 1, Dirty Projectors guitarist and vocalist Dave Longstreth will take part in an event as part of the Bartók Quartet Cycle series at New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art. Longstreth and the Calder Quartet will perform new work as well as new arrangements of Dirty Projectors music. They'll also perform music by Béla Bartók with new arrangements by Longstreth.Full Article

Oct. 12 at 7: The young, Los Angeles-based Calder Quartet, which plays the classics with as much conviction as it does contemporary fare, begins a three-concert fall series that mixes the string quartets of Bartók (here, the Quartets Nos. 1 and 5) with modern works (such as Peter Eötvös’s “Correspondence,” inspired by the letters of Leopold Mozart and his famous son). (Fifth Ave. at 82nd St. 212-570-3949.)Download PDF

Pianist Ann-Marie McDermott has long dreamed of recording a Mozart album. As a result, she had very definite ideas of the sound she was looking for when she recorded her latest album, Mozart: Piano Concertos."I would say the most important quality I wanted to capture in recording Mozart was the living dynamic joy of this repertoire. I didn't want it to sound like we had sat in a recording studio for three days and tried to make everything perfect. Of course that's what we did. But I wanted to make sure we were able to capture the spontaneity of this music and the joy and the sparkle."Download PDF | Full Article