KRONOS FESTIVAL 2017: Here and Now

Day 2 / “Carrying the Past”
Kronos Quartet with Van Dyke Parks and Soo Yeon Lyuh

Aleksandra Vrebalov / My Desert, My Rose **
Performed by Dragon String Quartet

Mohammad Reza Shajarian & Kayhan Kalhor (arr. Sahba Aminikia) / Rain +

Terry Riley / The Serquent Risadome *  SF Bay Area premiere

Hamza El Din (realized by Tohru Ueda) / Escalay (Water Wheel) *

Soo Yeon Lyuh / Yessori (Sound from the Past) *  World premiere
with special guest Soo Yeon Lyuh, haegeum

INTERMISSION

Van Dyke Parks (text by Lawrence Ferlinghetti) / Suite from Coney Island of the Mind * World premiere
with special guest Van Dyke Parks, speaker

Dan Becker / Carrying the Past *

About

Friday’s program will highlight some of Kronos Quartet’s local collaborations both old and new. Building on Kronos’ previous work with Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, composer Van Dyke Parks, best known as lyricist for the Beach Boys’ Smile and arranger of countless rock songs by everyone from U2 to Joanna Newsom, will join the quartet to recite the poetry of Lawrence Ferlinghetti, which Parks has set to music. A San Francisco icon, Ferlinghetti was the principal publisher of the Beat Generation and co-owns City Lights Bookstore. Kronos will be joined by haegeum virtuoso and University of California, Berkeley visiting scholar Soo Yeon Lyuh to premiere “Yessori,” which she has composed for her signature instrument (a two-stringed Korean fiddle) and string quartet.

Kronos will also revisit Minimalism master Terry Riley’s science fiction fantasia “The Serquent Risadome” (Bay Area premiere), Hamza El Din’s “Escalay” from Pieces of Africa, one of the best-selling and most beloved string quartet albums of all time, and San Francisco-based composer Dan Becker’s “Carrying the Past.” An arrangement of Kayhan Kalhor and Mohammad Reza Shajarian’s “Rain” by artist-in-residence Sahba Aminikia rounds out the evening.

The concert will begin with a very special guest performance by the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts’ premier Dragon String Quartet performing Aleksandra Vrebalov’s “My Desert, My Rose,” which was composed for Fifty for the Future: The Kronos Learning Repertoire. Launched in 2015, Kronos’ Fifty for the Future is an education program that is commissioning a free, open-access library of string quartets for the express purpose of guiding students and early-career professionals in developing and honing the skills required for the performance of 21st-century repertoire.

Reserved Seating / Robert N. Miner Auditorium
Tickets: $20 / $30 / $45 / $65 // Buy tickets >