Nell'anno dei suoi cinquant'anni di attività il Kronos Quartet prosegue le (auto)celebrazioni - dopo quelle di Amsterdam il mese scorso, con la presentazione integrale di Kronos 50 For The Future - con un festival di tre giorni in programma da domani a San Francisco, cui sono invitati a intervenire compositori amici e tre altri quartetti d'archi.
This year, Kronos Festival celebrates the diverse and dazzling array of works created for Kronos Fifty for the Future, a visionary commissioning, performance, education, and legacy project. Featuring pieces by Rhiannon Giddens, Philip Glass, Zakir Hussain, Angélique Kidjo, Terry Riley, Wu Man, and more, the Grammy-winning Kronos Quartet hosts the festival in multiple performances over three days, and is joined by fellow quartet innovators - Aizuri Quartet, Attacca Quartet, and Friction Quartet - plus special guests Rafiq Bhatia (guitar), Soo Yeon Lyuh (haegeum), sound artist and instrument-maker Victoria Shen, and student ensembles from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
First announced in 2015, KPAA’s Kronos Fifty for the Future has commissioned and published a collection of 50 new works for string quartet, creating an unprecedented resource for musicians around the world. Completed in 2022, the full Kronos Fifty for the Future library represents an ear-opening variety of stylistic and cultural perspectives. Through these pieces, players can develop skills that are fundamental to 21st-century repertoire while discovering a wealth of new compositional voices and ideas. Scores and parts, recordings, and supplemental materials for each work are available online for free. To date, these materials have been downloaded more than 30,000 times by visitors from 100+ countries and territories worldwide, reflecting the global reach of Kronos’ audience as well as the demand for a more expansive string quartet repertoire.