Born in South Africa but now an Irish citizen Kevin Volans? musical idiom has been shaped by an unusually diverse range of experiences including studies with Stockhausen in Cologne field trips to South Africa tostudy traditional music his own involvement with the New Simplicity movement his collection of contemporary art and African textiles friendships with composers like Morton Feldman and Gerald Barry as well as a love of virtuosopiano music which he performs broadcasts and records. While having an easily recognised unique voice Volans? music resists compartmentalisation. He is as comfortable working in conventional genres as embarking oninnovative collaborations with artists of other disciplines. String Quartet No.1 (White Man Sleeps) was written for the Kronos Quartet and was first performed by them in July 1986 London.The title?White Man Sleeps? comes from a moment in nyanga Panpipe music where the performers leave off playing their loud pipes for a few cycles and dance only to the sound of their ankle rattles to let the whitelandowner sleep for a minute or two.'In composing this piece I drew from the following sources: the first movement owes something to the style of Basotho concertina music; the second and fourth movements are drawnfrom traditional Nyungwe music played by Makina Chirenje and his Nyanga panpipe group at Nsava Tete Mozambique recorded and transcribed by Andrew Tracey (to be found in an article entitled ?The nyanga Panpipe dance? in AfricanMusic Vol.5 No.1 (1971); the third movement derives from the San bow music (recorded by Tony Traill of the University of Witwatersrand) and from Basotho lesiba music transcribed by myself; in the fifth movement I added my owninvented folklore. My approach to the original music was anything but purist it is played in Western tuning filtered slowed down by a few ?time-octaves? cast into non-African metres (like the 13-beat pattern of the first

String Quartet was composed by Mumbai-born Brian Elias in 2012 and was commissioned by the Jerusalem String Quartet. Lasting around 20 minutes this is the full score of the work arranged for Violin I Violin II Viola and Cello. The work has been laid out in the conventional four movements Allegro Adagio Presto Adagio-Allegro-Adagio but it is essentially a work in a single movement to be performed withno breaks. A set of double variations generates the thematic and harmonic material for the entire piece in its first few bars with a brilliant Viola solo afterwards. Throughout the piece changes in dynamics and tempocharacterise the different movements before finally ending with a calming return to the slow music.  You can purchase the individual instrument  Parts here.

Impressions On Beethoven's Harp Quartet. Par AMANTI LUCIO. When Cuarteto Casals approached me with the idea of illuminating Beethoven´s quartets anew, you can imagine the many thoughts and feelings that where going through my mind: what a joy, what a great honor… What an intriguing head-scratcher! How can you possibly shine a new light on something that is already perfect? Weeks, months went by in search of a common ground between the Master and myself until I finally found it in the realization that a word lays “hidden” in the St. John’s hymn that gave musical notes their original name: ‘Re, Sol, Ut, Io’ (D, G, C, B in English music notation) Perfect! “Resolutio” in Latin means both the resolution of a problem and the re-solution: a re-blend of many elements that will eventually coagulate to make something new. There was finally the melodic and a rhythmical canvas for my piece. On this canvas I wrote the story of a funny little contest, played on a sunny Mediterranean square, between street musicians and Cuarteto Casals just minutes before they are about to go on stage to perform Beethoven´s “Harp Quartet”. After all the characters, each in his own way, had the chance to tell their story, a gentle rain starts to fall, dissolving (Re-solving) again the music sheet to eventually leave us with just a white piece of paper for somebody else to continue the Work. (Lucio Franco Amanti) / Niveau : Avancé / Répertoire / 2 Violons, Alto et Violoncelle

Jouni Kaipainen's String Quartet No. 6 'The Terror Run' Op. 92. Commissioned by the BBC Radio for the Proms concerts 2010. Dedicated to the Meta4 Quartet. Parts available: WH31197A Programme note: My former experience in writing string quartets has made me used to the idea that a piece of mine in this genre lasts close to half an hour and consists of several movements with different characters. This time the commission clearly stated a duration of 12 minutes and this naturally brought about lots of thinking and orientating. Eventually I luckily found out that I actually can alter mybasic “string quartet philosophy” so that such a short piece became an existing option. In the music itself there is nothing very much to explain. The quartet is for the most part quite lively flowing music in fast tempi. In the very beginning there is something haunting in the atmosphere but soon joyful for the most part delicately light at times maybe also “dance-like” characters take over.  But in terms of dramaturgy   the music has a tendency to grow more weighty and harsh and these quasi-violent elements gradually threaten the sunny unproblematic flow. Closer to the end we come to a point where nothing is easy anymore. This brings about a slow section of quite different nature and after that the former hilarious swing tries to make a comeback – but does not really succeed. The run goes on but the overtones are now more shadowy and the mood on the scary side. The subtitle comes from the novel The Camomile Lawn (1984) by Mary Wesley of which Ken Taylor made a wonderful TV series adaptation for Channel 4 (1992) where a marvellous casting of great actors supports the colourful beautiful and delightful story. In this novel young Sophie (gorgeously played by the 10-year-old Rebecca Hall) has eagerly waited for her older cousins to arrive to her aunt’s house at the

Kevin Volans' String Quartet No. 9: Shiva Dances was commissioned by BBC Radio 3 and first performed by the Smith Quartet at the 2004 Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival.Kevin Volans (the composer) notes on the piece:In the past I have been interested in trying to go beyond historicism (1970s) beyond style(1980s) and beyond form (1990s) in my work. Looking back over the music of the twentiethcentury I was struck by the fact the nearlyall of it is extremely 'busy' almost cluttered. Italmost seemed that composers felt compelled to look industrious. In the new millennium Ithought it would be interesting to try and eliminate content. I also aspired to movingfrommusic (sound as art) to art (art as sound). This of course has already been done by a numberof composers (many from New York Phil Niblock and La Monte Young to name but two) butit was something I had never tried.AlthoughI found it annoying that the label 'minimalist' was given to my African-based work and fearing this would make the label stick I set out to write a piece which reflected my loveof minimal painting and architecture. The Japanesehave a term 'wabi' meaning 'voluntarypoverty' or 'emptiness' to describe their restrained minimal aesthetic an aesthetic which however pays greatest attention to the quality of material and fine detail. I like to think thatthelack of excessive pitch material in this piece reflects a kind of voluntary poverty.When Shiva is portrayed dancing (as Nataraj) He is depicted in a circle of flames crushing asmall figure the ego underfoot.You get theimpression He dances on the spot not movingaround at all. I like that.The piece is dedicated to Pablo Pascual Cilleruelo.