June 14-23: Telegraph Quartet Comes to Mount Gretna for Artist Residency with Gretna Music – Seven Performances in Nine Days
Photo of the Telegraph Quartet by Lisa Marie Mazzucco available in high resolution here.
Award-Winning Telegraph Quartet Comes to Mount Gretna for Nine-Day Artist Residency with Gretna Music from June 14-23
The Quartet will Perform Seven Concerts including
Music with Silent Films, Concerts for Kids, and House Concerts
“soulfulness, tonal beauty and intelligent attention to detail ... an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape.” – San Francisco Chronicle
Mt. Gretna, PA – The Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello), a group described by The Strad as having "precise tuning, textural variety and impassioned communication,” will be Gretna Music’s 2025 Artists-in-Residence this summer, giving a total seven performances over nine days from June 14-23, 2025 with events taking place at Mt. Gretna Playhouse (200 Pennsylvania Ave) and Hall of Philosophy (212 Gettysburg Ave.), and private residences. As part of the residency, the Telegraph will perform a wide variety of classical works both historical and modern, will connect with the community through interactive programs dedicated to children and families, and through intimate house concerts presented around the Mt. Gretna area.
The Telegraph Quartet formed in 2013 with an equal passion for standard and contemporary chamber music repertoire. Described by the San Francisco Chronicle as “an incredibly valuable addition to the cultural landscape” and “powerfully adept… with a combination of brilliance and subtlety,” the Telegraph Quartet was awarded the prestigious 2016 Walter W. Naumburg Chamber Music Award and the Grand Prize at the 2014 Fischoff Chamber Music Competition.
This residency will bring the Telegraph Quartet together with the Mt. Gretna community in ways that illuminate the group’s exemplary musicianship and affinity for educational experiences. Audiences can choose from a variety of settings to hear the group during their time in Mt. Gretna – at more traditional concert venues, at performances for families with younger listeners, or at casual and intimate house concerts. Highlights of the Telegraph Quartet’s performances include a concert featuring the music of Brahms, Henry Cowell, and Béla Bartók on June 15 with cellist Clyde Thomas Shaw and violist Doris Lederer collaborating on the Brahms’ String Sextet No. 2 in G Major, Op. 36; live music with pianist Jeffrey LaDeur accompanying the screening of short films, including College, the 1927 silent film directed by Buster Keaton on June 19; and a concert featuring music by Rebecca Clarke, Kenji Bunch, and Beethoven on June 22. Telegraph’s free family performances on June 16 and June 23 are open to the public. They will combine live classical music for young audiences, string instrument demonstrations, and an opportunity for children to ask the musicians questions. Full details on the Telegraph Quartet’s performances are below.
The Telegraph Quartet’s latest album, 20th Century Vantage Points: Divergent Paths, was released in 2023 on Azica Records. The first in the Telegraph’s three-album series focused on string quartets of the first half of the 20th century, Divergent Paths explores the bewildering and unbridled creativity of the period through the music of Arnold Schoenberg and Maurice Ravel, whose music on this album weaves threads of great contrast and surprising similarity. The album has been met with critical acclaim, with The New York Times reporting, “[I]n the Schoenberg, they achieve something truly special, meticulously guiding its often wayward progress. At times Schoenberg makes the four strings sound almost orchestral, but the Telegraph players can also make his contrapuntal tangles radiantly clear. Every minute of their account sounds gripping and purposeful, which is one of the highest compliments you can pay the piece.”
More about Telegraph Quartet: The Quartet has performed in concert halls, music festivals, and academic institutions across the United States and abroad, including New York City’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Chamber Masters Series, and at festivals including the Chautauqua Institute, Kneisel Hall Chamber Music Festival, and the Emilia Romagna Festival. The Quartet is currently the Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Michigan.
Notable collaborations include projects with pianists Leon Fleisher and Simone Dinnerstein; cellists Norman Fischer and Bonnie Hampton; violinist Ian Swensen; and the St. Lawrence Quartet and Henschel Quartett. A fervent champion of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, the Telegraph Quartet has premiered works by Osvaldo Golijov, John Harbison, Robert Sirota, and Richard Festinger.
In August 2023, the Telegraph Quartet released its latest album Divergent Paths, the first in a series of recordings titled 20th Century Vantage Points, on Azica Records. This first volume features two works that (to the best of the Quartet’s knowledge) have never been recorded on the same album before: Maurice Ravel’s String Quartet in F Major and Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet No. 1 in D minor, Op. 7. Through this series, the Telegraph Quartet intends to explore string quartets of the 20th century – an era of music that the group has felt especially called to perform since its formation. The New York Times praised the Telegraph’s performance as “…full of elegance and pinpoint control…” Divergent Paths follows Into The Light (Centaur, 2018), an album highlighting a gripping set of works by Leon Kirchner, Anton Webern, and Benjamin Britten.
Beyond the concert stage, the Telegraph Quartet seeks to spread its music through education and audience engagement. The Quartet has given master classes at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music Collegiate and Pre-College Divisions, through the Morrison Artist Series at San Francisco State University, and abroad at the Taipei National University of the Arts, National Taiwan Normal University, and in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. Telegraph has also served as artists-in-residence at the Interlochen Adult Chamber Music Camp, SoCal Chamber Music Workshop, and Crowden Music Center Chamber Music Workshop. In November 2020, the Telegraph Quartet launched ChamberFEAST!, a chamber music workshop in Taiwan. In fall 2020, Telegraph launched an online video project called TeleLab, in which the ensemble collectively breaks down the components of a movement from various works for quartet. In the summers of 2022 and 2024, the Telegraph Quartet traveled to Vienna to work with Schoenberg expert Henk Guittart in conjunction with the Arnold Schoenberg Center, researching all of Schoenberg's string quartets.
For more information, visit www.telegraphquartet.com.
Telegraph Quartet: Gretna Music’s 2025 Artists-in-Residence - Public Events
Telegraph Quartet with Cellist Clyde Thomas Shaw and Violist Doris Lederer
Sunday, June 15, 2025 at 3pm
Mt. Gretna Playhouse | 200 Pennsylvania Ave | Mt. Gretna, PA
Henry Cowell – String Quartet No. 4, “The United”
Béla Bartók – String Quartet No. 2
Brahms – String Sextet No. 2 in G Major, Op. 36 (with Doris Lederer and Clyde Shaw)
Tickets: www.gretnamusic.org
Free Family Event with the Telegraph Quartet
Monday, June 16, 2025 at 10am
Hall of Philosophy | 212 Gettysburg Ave. | Mt. Gretna, PA
Free and Open to the Public
Music with Film: Buster Keaton Silent Film - College
Telegraph Quartet and Pianist Jeffrey LaDeur
Thursday, June 19 at 7pm
Mt. Gretna Playhouse | 200 Pennsylvania Ave. | Mt. Gretna, PA
Tickets: www.gretnamusic.org
Telegraph Quartet
Sunday June 22, 2025 at 7:30pm
Mt. Gretna Playhouse | 200 Pennsylvania Ave. | Mt. Gretna, PA
Rebecca Clarke: Poem for String Quartet
Kenji Bunch: String Quartet No. 5: "Songs For A Shared Space"
Ludwig van Beethoven: String Quartet No. 7 in F Major, Op. 59 No. 1
Tickets: www.gretnamusic.org
Free Family Event with the Telegraph Quartet
Monday, June 23, 2025 at 10am
Hall of Philosophy | 212 Gettysburg Ave. | Mt. Gretna, PA
Free and Open to the Public