Rainier String Quartet Combines Music with Social Awareness   by Liz Fox '00
			The Rainier String Quartet Violinists Rebecca Huber and Johanna Bourkova, violist Jordan Voelker, and cellist Adam Friedberg, Conservatory students known collectively as the Rainier String Quartet, have joined their talents with their activism, in the Oberlin tradition. The socially responsible musicians held a series of benefit concerts throughout the State of Washington during Winter Term last January. Their performances of works by Beethoven, Borodin and Shostakovich--at the Seattle Art Museum, the Frye Art Museum, and several churches in Olympia--raised more than $1,000 in aid for the Global Children's Organization's summer camp in Croatia, Washington’s Refugee Assistance Program, and the Capital Area Youth Symphony Association. Huber’s contacts at the Refugee Assistance Program and her pre-college experience playing with the Capital Area Youth Symphony Orchestra provided the groundwork for the ensemble’s social outreach. Through her network of family and friends, she identified other organizations in need of assistance, and located concert halls where the ensemble could perform. The group also gave a series of concerts for youth at the Seattle Conservatory, the Pacific Academy Northwest, and at Seattle’s Meany Middle School, and gave master classes to members of the Capital Area Youth Symphony Orchestra. Listeners of Seattle’s classical music station, Classic KING FM 98.1, also heard the Oberlin ensemble perform the first movement of Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 3 in F major, Op. 73 and Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 18, No. 6 live on the program ‘Live by George’ on January 12. "Winter Term was a great time to do what we wanted--improve as musicians and help others," says Huber, a sophomore from Olympia, Washington. Huber and Friedberg, a senior from Boston, Massachusetts, developed the idea of forming an ensemble while touring Italy with former Oberlin faculty pianist Stephen Swedish. In Oberlin last fall, the students recruited Bourkova, a first year, and Voelker a sophomore. The new quartet sought musical guidance from violinist Ilya Teplyakov of the St. Petersburg String Quartet, which is in-residence at the Conservatory. "The formation of the quartet," says Huber, "provided a great opportunity to grow and rehearse with serious musicians." The Rainier String Quartet held its debut performance at the Washington Center for the Performing Arts in Olympia last November. They played Shostakovich's String Quartet No. 3 as guests of the Capital Area Youth Symphony Orchestra, under the direction of David Seamon. "The ensemble has had great success. We hope to sustain this," says Huber.
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