Segerstrom Center Concert Series Presents Elias String Quartet and Jonathan Biss, 3/27

SCFTA.org

Segerstrom Center Welcomes Elias String Quartet and Pianist Jonathan Biss in Their Concert Series

Elias String Quartet (c) David Shapiro

Debuts March 27, 2013 in Samueli Theater; tickets on sale now

COSTA MESA, CA – Segerstrom Center’s 2012-13  Concert Series concludes with a thrilling evening of music featuring the stellar young British ensemble, the Elias String Quartet, and award-winning American pianist Jonathan Biss – both making their Center debuts Wednesday, March 27 in Samueli Theater.

The program features Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s Piano Quintet No. 2 in E-flat Major, K.493; Leoš Janáček’s String Quartet No. 2 “Intimate Letters;” Henry Purcell’s Selected Fantasias for String Quartet and Robert Schumann’s Piano Quartet Op. 47.

Pianist Biss joins the ensemble for the Schumann. The Philadelphia Inquirer notes, “Few quartets at any stage of their evolution have this much personality.” Biss has been hailed by the Chicago Sun-Times as “a young virtuoso and poetic pianist of the first order.”

Tickets to Elias String Quartet and Jonathan Biss start at $25 and are available now at SCFTA.org, by calling (714) 556-2787 and at the Box Office at 600 Town Center Drive in Costa Mesa.

For inquiries about groupticket savings for 10 or more, call the Group Services office at (714) 755-0236. The TTY number is (714) 556-2746. A free Preview Talk with musicologist and author Herbert Glass will take place at 7:15 p.m. in Samueli Theater.

The Elias String Quartet members include Sara Bitlloch, violin; Donald Grant, violin; Martin Saving, viola and Marie Bitlloch, cello.

(c) Benjamin Ealovega

The quartet takes its name from Mendelssohn’s oratorio, “Elijah” (Elias in the German form), and has quickly established itself as one of the most intense and vibrant quartets of its generation. The quartet was formed in 1998 at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, wherethe ensemble worked closely with the late Dr. Christopher Rowland. The members also spent a year studying at the Hochschule in Cologne with the Alban Berg quartet.

Other mentors in the quartet’s studies include Hugh Maguire, György Kurtág, Gábor Takács-Nagy, Henri Dutilleux and Rainer Schmidt. The quartet received second prize and the Sidney Griller prize at the 9th London International String Quartet Competition in 2003 (as the Johnston String Quartet) and was a finalist in the Paolo Borciani Competition in 2005.

For four years, they were the resident string quartet at Sheffield’s “Music in the Round” as part of Ensemble 360, taking over from the Lindsay Quartet. From 2011 and 2015, the Elias String Quartet is committed to a Beethoven project, learning all 17 masterpieces and performing them on tour.

More can be learned about the Elias String Quartet at www.eliasstringquartet.com.

Jonathan Biss

Jonathan Biss represents the third generation in a family of professional musicians that includes his grandmother Raya Garbousova, one of the first well-known female cellists (for whom Samuel Barber composed his Cello Concerto), and his parents, violinist Miriam Fried and violist/violinist Paul Biss.  Biss began his piano studies at age six, and his first musical collaborations were with his mother and father. He studied at Indiana University with Evelyne Brancart and at The Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia with Leon Fleisher. He is now a member of the piano faculty of The Curtis Institute and has performed with The Curtis Symphony Orchestra in Philadelphia at the Kimmel Center.

Biss has been recognized with numerous awards, including the Leonard Bernstein Award presented at the 2005 Schleswig-Holstein Festival, Wolf Trap’s Shouse Debut Artist Award, the Andrew Wolf Memorial Chamber Music Award, Lincoln Center’s Martin E. Segal Award, an Avery Fisher Career Grant, the 2003 Borletti-Buitoni Trust Award and the 2002 Gilmore Young Artist Award. He was an artist-in-residence onAmerican Public Media’s Performance Today and was the first American chosen to participate in the BBC’s New Generation Artist program. For more information about Jonathan Biss and to read his blog about his life as a musician please visit www.jonathanbiss.com.

Segerstrom Center for the Arts applauds Omaha Steaks for its support of Elias String Quartet. The Center also applauds Acura, Official Automotive Sponsor of the Center. Classical KUSC is the Media Partner of the Concert Series. Segerstrom Center for the Arts is unique as both an acclaimed arts institution and as a multi-disciplinary cultural campus.

It is committed to supporting artistic excellence on all of its stages, offering unsurpassed experiences, and engaging the entire community in new and exciting ways through the unique power of live performance and a diverse array of inspiring programs.

Previously called the Orange County Performing Arts Center, Segerstrom Center is Orange County’s largest non-profit arts organization and owns and operates the 3,000-seat Segerstrom Hall and intimate 250-seat Founders Hall, which opened in 1986, and the 2,000-seat Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall, which opened in 2006 and also houses the 500-seat Samueli Theater, the Lawrence and Kristina Dodge EducationCenter’s studio performance space and Boeing Education Lab.