The Bellingham Festival of Music
in conjunction with Emerald City Music
presents
The Aizuri Quartet
in Music at the Manor
Winners of the 2018 Grand Prize at the M Prize Chamber Arts Competition
First Prize Winner of Osaka International Chamber Music Competition
Nominated for a 2019 Grammy Award
Sunday, February 16, 2020
Starting at 4:00 PM with appetizers and wine
Lairmont Manor
405 Fieldston Rd, Bellingham
“Genuinely exciting” – The New York Times
“Elegant, inquisitive” – The New Yorker
“Excellent” – The Washington Post
Don’t miss this award winning all female ensemble… in the Year of the Woman!!!
Performing their “Songs and Echoes of Home”:
Dvorák: Cypresses Quartet (selections)
Beecher: These Memories May Be True
Britten: String Quartet No. 1
Sibelius: String Quartet in D Minor “Voces intimae”
Komitas: Armenian Folk Songs (selections)
Tickets: $75
(not sold at the door)
To order, call: 360-201-6621 OR EMAIL:
bellinghamfestival@comcast.net
About the Aizuri Quartet:
Based in New York City, the Aizuri Quartet was the 2017-2018 MetLiveArts String Quartet-in-Residence at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The New York Times applaud them as “a quartet of expert collaborators, who cogently traverse a range of repertoire staples and modern works.” Previous residency engagements include: the 2015-2016 String Quartet-in-Residence at the Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts (Katonah, New York); resident ensemble of the 2014 Ravinia Festival’s Steans Music Institute; and, from 2014-2016, the String Quartet-in-Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia.
The Aizuri Quartet was awarded the Grand Prize and first prize at the 2018 M-Prize Chamber Arts Competition, along with top prizes at the 2017 Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in Japan, and the 2015 Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition in London. The Quartet’s debut album, Blueprinting, featuring new works written for the Aizuri Quartet by five American composers, was released by New Amsterdam Records and nominated for a 2019 GRAMMY Award.
The Quartet has performed extensively throughout North America, as well as in Europe, Japan, Mexico, Chile, Costa Rica, and Abu Dhabi, and has commissioned and premiered new works by Pulitzer Prize-winner Caroline Shaw, Lembit Beecher, Paul Wiancko, Yevgeniy Sharlat, and Alyssa Weinberg among others.
Violinists Miho Saegusa and Ariana Kim, violist Ayane Kozasa and cellist Karen Ouzounian formed the Aizuri Quartet in 2012. They are graduates of Juilliard and the Curtis Institutes. The Aizuri Quartet draws its name from “aizuri-e,” a style of predominantly blue Japanese woodblock printing that is noted for its vibrancy and incredible detail.