A USA Today reviewer once referred to the Colorado String Quartet as "one of the best girl groups."
			The Colorado String Quartet Muses about Teaching and Playing at Oberlin By Michael Chipman
			OCTOBER 22, 1998--"Our time at Oberlin has been wonderful," says Colorado String Quartet violinist Julie Rosenfeld. "The students are excellent musicians, but even more, they are smart, and they approach musical studies with such care." The Colorado String Quartet is composed of Rosenfeld; Deborah Redding, violin; Francesca Marin Silos, viola; and Diane Chaplin, cello. They have been together since 1983, the year the quartet won both the Banff String Quartet Competition and the Naumburg Chamber Music Award, which launched an international performing career. Fall 1998 marks the third Oberlin residency for the quartet. Besides coaching 12 small ensembles, the group will present a seminar on Beethoven's quartets. They will highlight one of the quartets--opus 18, number 5--October 27 as part of their Artist Recital Series concert. Rosenfeld describes the Beethoven quartet, one of his earlier works, as "a great one--and, like all Beethoven's quartets, technically difficult." The October 27 concert will also include Janacek's second quartet and Schubert's cello quintet with guest cellist Peter Rejto, Oberlin professor of violoncello. Rosenfeld says she and her colleagues eagerly anticipate the Schubert cello quintet. "Three of us have known Peter for several years. We have wanted to perform the Schubert quintet with him for a long time, so this was the perfect opportunity." Guest artists in performance do not disrupt the ensemble's eminent sound, says Rosenfeld. "We have played so much together that we know what our idea of a piece is and we go from there. We hope that any collaborator will bring different ideas to the piece. We have played with Peter so many times that I'm sure he will easily blend into our ensemble." "Balance is the key to a string quartet's success," says Rosenfeld. "Our goal is to create one voice out of four, to unify our personalities and voices into one sound. That unity is not easily achieved. We spent the seven months before the 1993 Banff competition working nonstop to unify our sound through matching vibrato, timber, etc. Then part of the Banff prize included three months of intensive coaching and ensemble work at the Banff festival. That groundwork was incredibly important to everything else we've done." The third piece on the concert is Janacek's relatively unknown second quartet, subtitled, "Intimate Letters" by the composer. Rosenfeld describes this piece as an autobiographical work. "It describes musically Janacek's emotional state during an affair he had with a young woman. Each of the four movements has an epigraph which describes what the music is about." Many people ask, Rosenfeld says, about the all-women status of the group. "I don't know what it's like not to play in an all-female ensemble," says Rosenfeld. "Perhaps there are different expectations of women string players out there, but I don't think we sound any different than men. When we won the Banff competition, all of the judges were men. One of them, Misha Schneider, came up to me after the competition and said, 'You know, I used to tell all of my female students, 'You must play like men.' Now, after I have heard the Colorado String Quartet, I will tell my male students, 'You must play like women!'" The Colorado String Quartet's Artist Recital Series concert will begin at 8 P.M. in Finney Chapel.