The Miró String Quartet Returns on Thursday, March 23, at 8 p.m. in Finney Chapel Story by Claire Chase
	THE PROGRAM: String Quartet in E-Flat Major, Op. 125 No.1, by Franz Schubert (1797-1828) • Allegro moderato • Scherzo: Prestissimo • Adagio • Allegro String Quartet No. 1, by Leo Janácek (1854-1928) After Leo N. Tolstoy's "The Kreutzer Sonata" • Adagio • Con moto • Con moto-Vivace- Andante- Tempo I • Con moto-Adagio- Maestoso- Tempo I Intermission String Quartet in A-Flat Major, Op. 105, by Antonín Dvorák (1854-1928) • Adagio, ma non troppo- Allegro appassionato • Molto vivace • Lento e molto cantabile • Allegro, non tanto		When The Miró String Quartet, formed at the Oberlin Conservatory in 1995, returns to perform on Thursday, March 23, at 8 p.m. in Finney Chapel, the Oberlin concert will be sandwiched between two other performances: one at Carnegie Hall and another at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Prestigious venues may provide one testament to the quartet's success, but as cellist Joshua Gindele ('97) explained in an interview via cell phone on his way to the Carnegie Hall gig, "You know, Isaac Stern will be in the audience here in New York tonight. Somehow, though, I'm less afraid of him than I am of Gregory Fulkerson peeking his head in on Thursday evening. I think we're more nervous for the Oberlin performance than for either of the other two, in New York or in Washington! We don't know who will be in the audience in the big halls, but we certainly know who will be there in Oberlin." From prestigious engagements in top venues to casual concerts in inner-city public schools, the Miró Quartet has performed in nearly premiere venues from coast to coast and abroad. They've enchanted audiences at Alice Tully Hall, Weill Concert Hall, Merkin Concert Hall, the Grand Canyon Music Festival, the Skaneateles Festival, Orange County Performing Arts Center, on Shelter Island, and at the Jerusalem Music Center, to name a few. They've received national attention as guests on the Today Show, the Canadian Broadcasting Company and, at the request of Isaac Stern, the Public Broadcasting Service. They've been awarded top prizes in the national chamber music competitions of Coleman, Fischoff and Banff, and they're now working as teaching assistants to the Juilliard String Quartet as recipients of the Lisa Arnhold Fellowship for String Quartet Studies. There seems to be little the group - violinists Daniel Ching ('95) and Sandy Yamamoto, violist John Largess and cellist Joshua Gindele - hasn't yet accomplished. Through it all, they haven't forgotten their Oberlinian roots. To prove it, the group found time in their hectic schedules to offer local audiences a taste of their talent on Thursday in a program of works by Schubert, Janácek and Dvorák will comprise the program for this concert, which is free and open to the public. About The Program: "We've played the Schubert and the Dvorák quite a bit, but the Janácek is fairly new to us," remarks Gindele. "All four of us heard this quartet, and decided that it, coupled with the Schubert and the Dvorák, would work well with our ideas about how we want to create programs...We like to balance the intellectual with the more emotional, so that the program takes the audience on some kind of journey. "The Schubert String Quartet in E-flat major, Op. 125, No. 1 was written for Schubert's family, so each part was suited for a particular member of the family. His cellist, for example, wasn't all that great, so the part is quite easy. But the violin and viola parts are more difficult. It's a very simple work, balanced and light. The Janácek is its polar opposite. The quartet is much more complicated, very emotional and dramatic. It's based on Tolstoy's novella "The Kreutzer Sonata," a story about an adulterous love triangle culminating in a jealous murder. A man hears about his wife's affair with a handsome violinist, and is ultimately driven to murder her! "Dvorák wrote half of his String Quartet in A-flat major, Op. 105 while in America, and then after experiencing severe writer's block, moved back to Czechoslovakia to finish the rest of it there. The end result is somewhat of a dichotomy between American folk music and Czech folk music. His love for America and his longing for home are both apparent in the work. The point at which he returns home is obvious in the score, because the spirit is suddenly uplifted." Miró's December 1999 performance of this Dvorák piece at the Orange County Performing Arts Center in Southern California was hailed by Chris Pasles of the Los Angeles Times as "brilliant." Pasles wrote, "Like the work of their painter namesake, the Miró Quartet embodies an exquisite balance among strong, individual parts." Miró: From the Academic World to the Professional World Gregory Fulkerson, professor of violin, Gindele says, was the primary guiding force to Miró's inception as a professional ensemble. "He really made things happen, along with help from other faculty members like Andor Toth, Marilyn McDonald and Peter Rejto. We were launched by the Coleman and Fischoff Competitions, of course, but the Banff Competition gave us a national concert tour, and things really started to happen." Despite their post-Oberlin success, Gindele admits that Miró's journey into professionalism hasn't been altogether easy. "People think that having a career as a chamber musician is some kind of glamorous lifestyle. It isn't. It takes more work than I ever anticipated. The travelling, the administrative details, the management all take persistence. And despite what it may appear to the outside world, the career itself moves very slowly. And the travelling can really wear you out. Fortunately, we now have great management, and we're playing in great places, but my advice to young groups at Oberlin is to stay persistent. Things really aren't as easy as they seem."
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