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Dedicated To The Future of Timeless Music, Youthful Verona Quartet Plays Fontana

Joseph Ong, Brittany Florenz

At this point in the collective life of the Verona Quartet, it's all about expanding their horizons. Winners of the 2015 Concert Artist Guild Victor Elmaleh Competition, the quartet makes its first appearance in Kalamazoo tonight at the Fontana Summer Music Festival.

The last few years have taken the Verona Quartet to Japan, Australia, Abu Dhabi, London, and Lincoln Center, all while receiving mentorship from the Juilliard String Quartet as the Graduate Resident String Quartet at the Juilliard School. Formed in 2013 at Indiana University, the group has been focused on putting great swaths of musical literature under their fingertips, according to violist Abigail Rojansky.

Violinist Dorothy Ro says the Verona Quartet's Fontana program is a perfect overview of quartet music: from Haydn, to Beethoven, to Bartok and Webern. Cellist Warren Hagerty says that in their most exalted playing, the quartet sounds like a single instrument with a unified purpose. And to violinist Jonathan Ong, the audience is an indispensable part of re-creating music from the page.

Cara Lieurance is the local host of NPR's All Things Considered on 1021 WMUK and covers local arts & culture on Let's Hear It on 89.9 Classical WMUK weekday mornings at 10 - 11 am.
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