Kronos Quartet
“David Harrington, the Kronos’ artistic director and founder, once said, ‘I’ve always wanted the string quartet to be vital, and energetic, and alive, and cool, and not afraid to kick ass… But it has to be expressive of life. To tell the story with grace and humour and depth.’ With Floodplain, the Kronos Quartet has done all the above. Once again, they’ve pushed boundaries to produce a disc that stretches, excites and inspires the senses… Full marks to the Kronos Quartet for championing countries more known in the West for their instability than for their rich musical cultures. It’s the vibrant musical performances though, saturated with humanity, pathos and soul, which give this disc its edge.”
On Floodplain, the Kronos Quartet explores work from the Middle East, South Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe with original arrangements of traditional music and newly commissioned pieces. Floodplains are extremely fertile tracts of land that border rivers, and many have been settled for millennia. The album was inspired by the idea that floodplains—which are prone to devastating flooding—will experience new life after a catastrophe, just as cultures that undergo great difficulty will experience creative fertility.
Kronos’ artistic director and founder David Harrington says, “Floodplain was imagined and recorded during one era in American politics, and then released during a very different one. Our work is a continuously evolving interaction with the world we are a part of, and we are always trying to find ways to reflect what it means to be musicians today.”
SELECT CREDITS
Kronos Quartet
David Harrington, violin, shruti box, duo dunia, gusle
John Sherba, violin, duo dunia, tapan
Hank Dutt, viola, tambourine, kina cha viola
Jeffrey Zeigler, cello, beguèna maridhia
with
Jamie Papish, riqq, darbukka
Alim Qasimov Ensemble
Terry Riley, tambura
Wu Man, electric sitar
Produced by David Harrington
Co-produced by Scott Fraser
Executive Producer: Robert Hurwitz
Released by Nonesuch Records
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