Brooklyn Rider

Edit Content

The current concert season is strongly illustrative of the intrepid musical appetite of Brooklyn Rider. This fall, they began unveiling a major new commissioning and programmatic venture called The Four Elements; an exploration of the four classical elements (earth, air, water, and fire) as both metaphor for both the complex inner world of the string quartet and the current health of planet Earth. This winter, the quartet will also release The Wanderer, their first ever live concert recording, made in Palieusius Manor in Eastern Lithuania while on tour last spring. The album consists of two works written recent works written for Brooklyn Rider by Gonzalo Grau and Osvlado Golijov, as well as Schubert’s iconic “Death and the Maiden” String Quartet. This season also sees the quartet reuniting with Magos Herrera across the US for their Dreamers project.

The 2021-22 season boasted two unique collaborative ventures: one with Israeli mandolin virtuoso Avi Avital, and the other, a brand new phase of work with Swedish mezzo soprano Anne Sofie von Otter, where they explored themes of love and death through the music of Franz Schubert and Rufus Wainwright. Also, 2022’s release of The Stranger (Avie Records) with tenor Nicholas Phan was recently nominated for a 2023 Grammy® Award and made numerous “best of” lists for 2022, including The New Yorker.

Brooklyn Rider has remained steadfast in their commitment to generate new music and collaborative ventures at nearly every phase of their history. Shared during the global pandemic at the height of the US lockdown, the Grammy®-nominated recording Healing Modes (In A Circle Records) was described by The New Yorker as a project which “…could not possibly be more relevant or necessary than it is currently.” That same season also saw the release of two projects from vastly different musical spheres— The Butterfly with the master Irish fiddler Martin Hayes (In A Circle Records) and the other, Sun On Sand (Nonesuch Records), featuring the saxophone great Joshua Redman. In fall 2018, Brooklyn Rider released Dreamers on Sony Music Masterworks with Mexican jazz vocalist Magos Herrera. These projects, along with the rest of Brooklyn Rider’s extensive discography, have helped give rise to NPR Music’s observation that Brooklyn Rider is “recreating the 300-year-old form of string quartet as a vital and creative 21st-century ensemble.”

REPERTORY

2024/2025 SEASON

Edit Content

Upon One Note

An exploration of ingenious works revolving around C; from Mozart’s wildly inventive “Dissonance” Quartet to Betsy Jolas’ musings on the building blocks of the string quartet (String Quartet #3) to the otherworldly soundscape of Arvo Pärt’s Solfeggio to Brahms’ c minor swirling masterpiece (Op. 51, #1). Not to be left out, the audience will collectively embody the C, joining Brooklyn Rider in Purcell’s magical Fantasia Upon One Note.

Edit Content

Philip Glass – The Complete Quartets

On the occasion of their 20th Anniversary, Brooklyn Rider celebrates their long-standing relationship with Philip Glass with concert formats devoted to Glass’s historic contribution to the string quartet genre. First, intended as a multi part Festival-style presentation, Brooklyn Rider presents a
comprehensive retrospective of the complete music for string quartet by Philip Glass. Also, as a presentation called “Temples of Resonance” a single concert program featuring a selection of Glass’s most beloved scores for the medium.

Edit Content

Chalk and Soot

Brooklyn Rider & Ariadne Greif (soprano)

Celebrating two decades together, this is Brooklyn Rider’s homage to their namesake, “Der Blaue Reiter,” a pioneering pre-WWI artistic collective that counted among its members Arnold Schoenberg and Wassily Kandinsky. Colin Jacobsen’s song cycle, Chalk and Soot, built upon Kandinsky’s Dada-inspired text, is paired with Schoenberg’s daring Second String Quartet, both featuring the mesmerizing American singer, Ariadne Greif. And in a second installment of 2014’s highly celebrated Brooklyn Rider Almanac, four newly commissioned works complete the experience: Clarice Assad, Gabriel Kahane, Giovanni Solima and Tyshawn Sorey.

Edit Content

The Butterfly

Brooklyn Rider and Martin Hayes

The Butterfly celebrates a decade-long musical friendship between legendary Irish fiddler, Martin Hayes and Brooklyn Rider. Drawing from the rich repertoire of Irish traditional music, this collaboration identifies a unique common ground between their respective bowed instrument traditions.

"Brooklyn Rider is first and foremost a string quartet, and an excellent one at that, and its string quartet-ness neither defines nor limits its capabilities. Ride on. ”

-BOSTON GLOBE

Residency & Engagement Offerings

Brooklyn Rider is excited to present a range of musical encounters for curious learners of all ages. These activities draw on the unique career trajectory and musical DNA of Brooklyn Rider, honed over more than fifteen years of expansive programming, adventurous collaboration, and playing for audiences worldwide. The following experiences can be tailored to best suit your communities or to the scope of the visit.

GALLERY

EXPLORE

"Exit" from Chalk and Soot

Tiny Desks w/ Magos Herrera

Brooklyn Rider – Live at Fraser

"I don't believe I've ever experienced the radical emotional range of Op. 132's long, slow movement — with its liberating, dancing interjections — more intensely than when listening to the entirety of Healing Modes.” —The New York Times

The pedigree of this foursome is incontestable; borne out of the finest institutions (Juilliard and Curtis), they have amassed an astonishing body of work over their 15-year journey. Collectively, they create a unique program format, comfortably presenting in a single evening, mixes that may span centuries of music or bring to life the most contemporary expressions of quartet literature. Whatever the architecture of the program, audiences are listening to four masters of the discipline who bring audiences forward in an appreciation of the genre.

PRESS

The Harvard Crimson

“Brooklyn Rider Promises an Evocative Musical Experience”

Boston Globe

“Brooklyn Rider is first and foremost a string quartet, and an excellent one at that, and its string quartet-ness neither defines nor limits its capabilities. Ride on.”

NPR

“‘A concert should be a gathering place for collective conversation and imagining’”Brooklyn Rider’s Nicholas Cords on Beethoven, Gratitud And The Power of Creativity”

Follow Us