Del Sol Quartet – Soundings 4.3: Shaw & Bonsai

Soundings is an artistic journey that delves deeply into the musical language of one piece; the evening is an exploration with two performances, in-depth discussions, and curated visual art. Soundings 4.3 features Caroline Shaw’s “Entr’acte {a minuet and trio}”, with bonsai presentation by Eric Schrader, president of the Bonsai Society of SF.
6:30PM – reception with the artists
7:00PM – performance, & discussions
Composer:
Caroline Shaw (b. 1982) is the youngest composer ever to win the Pulitzer Prize for Music (2013) for her enigmatic “Partita for 8 Voices,” described by the jury as a “highly polished and inventive a cappella work uniquely embracing speech, whispers, sighs, murmurs, wordless melodies and novel vocal effects.” Born in North Carolina, she began playing the violin at the age of two and started composing at age 10. She is also a Grammy Award winning singer in the contemporary vocal group Roomful of Teeth, a violinist with American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME), and has performed and collaborated with other musicians, including Kanye West. As a composer, Shaw has been commissioned by the Carmel Bach Festival, Cincinnati Symphony, Guggenheim Museum and others. She holds degrees from Rice, Yale and is a doctoral candidate in composition at Princeton.


Bonsai:
Eric Schrader is a San Francisco-based bonsai enthusiast, photographer, and writer, who grew up in Boonville, CA, among redwoods, oaks and buckeye trees. Bonsai, the art of planting and caring for miniature trees in pots, has a long history in the Bay Area beginning in the 1800’s with Japanese immigration. Schrader is president of the Bonsai Society of SF, teaches bonsai classes and has been featured in local magazines and blogs. His art form captures the essence of trees as living sculptures and provides an avenue for exploring the natural world, cultural tradition, artistic voice, and compositional process.


Quartet:
Hailed by Gramophone as “masters of all musical things they survey,” the Del Sol String Quartet shares living music with an ever-growing community of adventurous listeners. Fascinated by the feedback loop between social change, technology, and artistic innovation, the San Francisco-based ensemble is a leading force in 21st century chamber music whether introducing Ben Johnston’s microtonal Americana at the Library of Congress, exploring Andean soundscapes with Gabriela Lena Frank and traditional musicians, deconstructing Ruth Crawford’s radical experimental processes with East Bay schoolchildren, or rocking Mason Bates’ techno grooves in his San Francisco dance party. The New York Times praised Del Sol’s most recent recording, Scrapyard Exotica, “See if your foot can stay still once you put on this funky disc of rhythmically infectious… music played by the adventurous Del Sol String Quartet.”