John Luther Adams' Canticles Of The Sky for String Quartet. Composer's Note: In the Arctic sky the low angle of the sun and heavy ice crystals in the air often produce vivid halos arcs andsundogs (parhelia). Sometimes these phenomena create the illusion of multiple suns. 'Sky With Four Suns' is a musical evocation of such an apparition from sunrise to sunset. Similar visions also occur at night which isthe image behind 'Sky With Four Moons.' 'Sky With Nameless Colors' and 'Sky With Endless Stars' evoke the extraordinary depth and clarity of Sonoran Desert skies. This music is drawn from Canticles of the Holy Wind– a concert-length work for four choirs and vocal soloists. In this version sixteen separate choral parts have been condensed into the string quartet. String designations should be carefully observed. Frequent stringcrossings are employed to create as lush and continuous textures as possible. All sounds should be legato. Bowing is free and full throughout. Total performance duration is about 18:00

Berkeley's second string quartet uses a free random presentation of thematic material. There is a sharp contrast between the tight and rhythmic central section and the final passage which dispenses with barlines altogether providing a fascinating journey through interrelated and continuous sections.

Berkeley's second string quartet uses a free random presentation of thematic material. There is a sharp contrast between the tight and rhythmic central section and the final passage which dispenses with barlines altogether providing a fascinating journey through interrelated and continuous sections.

Described by its composer as ???a fantasia??? Carl Vine???s dramatic String Quartet No.5 (2007) contains six clear sections but like much of his music is cast in one continuous movement. There is some repetition and development of material throughout the 22-minute work (which has been recorded by the Goldner String Quartet on ABC Classics) but this is less important to its structure than the vivid musical contrasts which delineate its formal arc.

String Quartet No.2 was composed by Hans Abrahamsen in 1981. Programme note: Hans Abrahamsens's second string quartet was commissioned by the Lerchenborg music-week of 1981 during which it was first performed by the Gaudeamus Quartet. In Hans Abrahamsen's second quartet it is the continuous alternation of soberness and drama that first catches the listner's ears: the lyrical/gestural tradition as we know it from Arnold Schoenberg and Alban Berg pitched - not against - but around the 'sober barbarism' which is characteristic of rhytmic neo-classicism. Both the first and the last movement of th is quartet are emotional at manylevels: sad - and still seething with life and always unpredictable in their development it is night twilight and white-hot light. Sparkling diamonds set off by scarlett velvet. The two middle movements link the contrasts without cushioning: the second movement a gruelling stripped rhythmical drill followed by a hushed far-off dance in triple meter which shifts and hesitates all the time though. There is an ambience of the classics glimpsed through many veils. The second quartet is music which is fraught with danger in its ambiguous relation to tradition: the past emerges as a most relevant and living ghost. The Beauty and the Beast as musical drama.

Described by its composer as ‘a fantasia’ Carl Vine’s dramatic String Quartet No.5 (2007) contains six clear sections but like much of his music is cast in one continuous movement. There is some repetition and development of material throughout the 22-minute work (which has been recorded by the Goldner String Quartet on ABC Classics) but this is less important to its structure than the vivid musical contrasts which delineate its formal arc.