Nov. 18: Telegraph Quartet Give TeleLab Concert Presented by San Francisco Conservatory of Music
Telegraph Quartet Presented by San Francisco Conservatory of Music in TeleLab Concert
Live Discussion and Performance of Music by Arnold Schoenberg
Photo by Lisa Marie Mazzucco available in high resolution at www.jensenartists.com/telegraph-quartet
Friday, November 18, 2022 at 7:30pm Sol Joseph Recital Hall at San Francisco Conservatory of Music 50 Oak Street | San Francisco, CA
Tickets and more information: https://sfcm.edu/performance-calendar/event/telegraph-string-quartet
“The programming … bespeaks a wonderful boldness of spirit, and the [Quartet’s] performances, which are vibrant and full of exploratory fervor, follow through beautifully.” – San Francisco Chronicle
Telegraph Quartet: www.telegraphquartet.com
San Francisco, CA – On Friday, November 18, 2022 at 7:30pm, the Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello) will be presented by the San Francisco Conservatory of Music at Sol Joseph Recital Hall (50 Oak Street). For this event, the Telegraph Quartet will give a live and in-person presentation of their TeleLab concert experience, with a program dedicated exclusively to Arnold Schoenberg’s String Quartet No. 1 in D minor, Op. 7.
During the height of lockdown in the fall of 2020, the Telegraph Quartet launched an online video project they named TeleLab, in which the ensemble collectively breaks down the components of a movement from various works for quartet. TeleLab draws the listener deeper into how those components fit together and evolve over the course of the piece. Through a combination of detailed explanation and curated live demonstration, TeleLab gives the audience the time and space to deepen their experience of music the Quartet performs. The beginning of the event will be devoted to analysis and live demonstration of Schoenberg’s first quartet. This will be followed by a full, uninterrupted performance of the work, which will bring all the insights of the prior discussions into their musical contexts and ultimately provide audiences with a fuller perspective of Schoenberg’s bold and dramatic work.
Of the opportunity to bring TeleLab to a live, in-person audience, Telegraph Quartet says:
“This is one of our passion projects and Schoenberg and his first string quartet was in fact the whole reason we started the TeleLab to begin with. The idea of TeleLab was inspired in part by an idea of Schoenberg’s from 1918, “the Society for Private Musical Performances” where among other things the goal was to give clear and repetitive performances of the works of his time, with the aim of familiarizing the audience with unfamiliar and new works. This is the spirit of our TeleLab of Schoenberg’s String Quartet No. 1, an overwhelmingly enormous and complex work that begs to be pulled apart to see how the many themes and emotions of the work interact, evolve and transform to create this vast emotional story.”
Greatly inspired by Wagner and Mahler, Schoenberg manages to pack an unending wealth of musical themes and tortuous counterpoint into the four voices of his String Quartet No. 1, creating a kind of Wagnerian epic in chamber form. It has both a Dionysian excess and a rigorously worked-out overarching structure that ties the entire work together in almost one breath.
About the Telegraph Quartet: The Telegraph Quartet (Eric Chin and Joseph Maile, violins; Pei-Ling Lin, viola; Jeremiah Shaw, cello) formed in 2013 with an equal passion for the standard chamber music repertoire and contemporary, non-standard works alike. 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. 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 on the chamber music faculty at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music as the Quartet-in-Residence.
Notable collaborations include projects with pianists Leon Fleisher and Simone Dinnerstein; cellists Norman Fischer and Bonnie Hampton; violinist Ian Swensen; composer-vocalist Theo Bleckmann; and the Henschel Quartett. A fervent champion of 20th- and 21st-century repertoire, the Telegraph Quartet has premiered works by John Harbison, Robert Sirota, and Richard Festinger.
In 2018 the Quartet released its debut album, Into the Light, featuring works by Anton Webern, Benjamin Britten, and Leon Kirchner on the Centaur label. The San Francisco Chronicle praised the album, saying, "Just five years after forming, the Bay Area’s Telegraph Quartet has established itself as an ensemble of serious depth and versatility, and the group’s terrific debut recording only serves to reinforce that judgment." AllMusic acclaimed, “An impressive beginning for an adventurous group, this 2018 release puts the Telegraph Quartet on the map.” In spring 2023, the Telegraph Quartet will release its next album on Azica Records, featuring Ravel’s renowned quartet and Schoenberg’s first quartet.
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.
Highlights of Telegraph Quartet’s 2022-23 season include performances presented by Stanford Live, The Argyros, Emerald City Music, UCLA's Chamber Music at the Clark, Chicago Chamber Music Society, Carmel Music Society, South Mountain Concerts, and many others, as well as a residency at the University of Idaho as part of the Auditorium Chamber Music Series. Telegraph will also perform residency concerts at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. For more information, visit www.telegraphquartet.com.
About the San Francisco Conservatory of Music: At the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, we give students the framework and foundation to succeed throughout their studies and careers, creating a path of lifelong learning. More than any other world-class conservatory, we focus on educating the whole person, with an interconnected curriculum that breaks down barriers between the intellectual, artist, professional, and individual. Our faculty, facilities, and position at the heart of the San Francisco music scene have helped SFCM seize a leading role in preparing—and defining—the 21st-century musician.