Werner Quartet in concert at MSU's Reynolds Hall March 2

The Werner Quartet will perform works for cello and piano, and cello quartet, in a dazzling musical fanfare on Friday, March 2, at Reynolds Recital Hall on the campus of Montana State University.

This will be the quartet's fourth visit to Reynolds, where its musical vitality and artistry were enthusiastically received in March of last year.

The Werner Quartet, featuring young artists Helene, Luc, Mariel and Andree Werner, performs regularly as a cello quartet and as soloists, and they are known to many in and around the Bozeman area for their musical involvement with Montana's Shakespeare in the Parks, the Children's Shelter, the Emerson Cultural Center, the Family Cancer Network, HatcHFest and Bozeman's Annual Christmas Stroll. The quartet has been enthusiastically received at the American Cello Congress, the Gindi Auditorium in Los Angeles, St. Timothy's Summer Music Festival and Montana State University's Guest Artist Series, as well as in master classes with acclaimed faculty at Aspen Music Festival, the Cleveland Institute of Music and the Paris Conservatory.

The program will feature a spectacular kaleidescope of musical periods and styles, opening with all four cellos in full voice for Luigi Boccherini's "Cello Sonata No. 6 in A Major." Following will be the epitome of romanticism, Chopin's "Cello Sonata in G minor," with the piano and cello dueling for emotional supremacy. Works by Shostakovich, Schumann and Martinu are also included. The first half closes with a collection of Astor Piazzolla's sultry tangos.

The second half will include Johannes Brahms' "Cello Sonata in D Major," arguably one of the most beautiful works ever written for the cello. Also on the program is the only known composition for the arpeggione, that peculiar cello-guitar hybrid, adapted for cello in a "technically treacherous" arrangement, courtesy of Franz Schubert. Other featured works includes "Polonaise Brillante" by Chopin, and Beethoven's variations on Handel's oratorio, "Judas Maccabaeus." The program comes to a stirring conclusion when all four cellist come back to the stage to perform a glittering jewel of cello literature, Haydn's "Cello Concerto in C major."

The performance will begin at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $10 for non-students and $5 for students. For ticket information call 994-3562.

Reader Comments