Beo String Quartet with over 40 World premiers returns to Foxburg, PA.
As the title implies, Tradition will meet Innovation when the Beo String Quartet appears onstage at Foxburg’s Lincoln Hall on Sunday, October 3rd at 2:00 PM. Presented by Allegheny RiverStone Center for the Arts, this premier new ensemble’s performances have been hailed for their virtuosity, rhythmic vitality and crystal clear articulation, going deep inside the music. Now in their sixth season, they have performed over 100 concert works in the US and Europe – including over 40 world premieres. Nationally acclaimed as consummate Teaching Artists, in 2018, BEO performed a brilliant arts education residency in ARCA’s Educational ArtReach Program in the Allegheny-Clarion Valley Schools.
A shared dedication to the continued understanding, exploration, and love of music is what inspired the musicians to form the Beo String Quartet in 2015. The ensemble performs the masterpieces of the string quartet repertoire, collaborates with living composers, and engages new listeners through performance, thoughtful demonstration, and a strong social media presence.
Their refreshing program will be a meeting of tradition and innovation not only to uplift and entertain but also to stimulate thought and awaken new understanding.
Beo’s commitment to innovation brings them to collaborate with composers and push the boundaries of the string quartet literature. Composer Marc Mellits of the University of Illinois at Chicago said of their performance of one of his works, “what impressed me most was how they got deep inside my music and put themselves into my sound world to create something new and powerful. Their interpretation of my quartet was simply astounding and showed tremendous maturity and drive. They played every note like it was the last note they would ever play! An absolutely spectacular group of young, hungry musicians.”
On the first half Beo will perform Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 14 in C# Minor, op.131. A profoundly beautiful and powerful work, upon listening to a performance of this quartet composer Franz Schubert remarked, ”After this, what is left for us to write?” And Robert Schumann said that this quartet and the entire opus had a ”grandeur…which no words can express… on the extreme boundary of all that has hitherto been attained by human art and imagination.”
Undaunted by the ineffable, Beo violist and composer Sean Neukom has written a work entitled, 19-20, inspired by the COVID pandemic and all that it has wrought in our lives – particularly in the arts and the world of live musical performances as we have known it. In addition to two shorter works, Beo will perform 19-20, a multi-movement work steeped in music, theater, technology, and observation. For music lovers concerned if classical music could survive the most recent onslaught of the COVID lock down closures, Neukom’s 19-20 seeks to answer this question. The work ultimately ponders the importance and necessity of art in a post-Covid world.
An annual resident with the Charlotte New Music Festival, its founder Elizabeth Kowalski said, ”Beo String Quartet is without a doubt the most professional, talented, and visionary ensemble that I have ever worked with.”
Tickets: Adults $25, ARCA Members $20, Students $5. Buy online at alleghenyriverstone.org or call 724-659-3153 to reserve.