Washington College Concert Series Moves To New Gibson Center For The Arts

Brentano String Quartet Part Of Gala Opening Weekend

Chestertown – The 58^th season of the Washington College Concert Series is moving to a new venue: the renovated and expanded Gibson Center for the Arts.

The Concert Series opener, a performance by the internationally acclaimed Brentano String Quartet, will be presented in the Hotchkiss Recital Hall at Gibson on Sunday, October 4, at 3 p.m., as part of the arts center’s gala opening weekend festivities.

Since its inception in 1992, the Brentano String Quartet has appeared throughout the world to popular and critical acclaim.

“Passionate, uninhibited and spellbinding,” raves the London Independent; the New York Times extols its “luxuriously warm sound [and] yearning lyricism.” The Philadelphia Inquirer praises its “seemingly infallible instincts for finding the center of gravity in every phrase and musical gesture,” and the Times of London opines, “the Brentanos are a magnificent string quartet... This was wonderful, selfless music-making.”

Within a few years of its formation, the quartet garnered the first Cleveland Quartet Award and the Naumburg Chamber Music Award. In 1996 the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center invited the group to be the inaugural members of Chamber Music Society Two, a program which was to become a coveted distinction for chamber groups and individuals.

The quartet had its first European tour in 1997, and was honored in the U.K. with the Royal Philharmonic Award for Most Outstanding Debut. That debut recital was at London’s Wigmore Hall, and the quartet has continued its warm relationship with Wigmore, appearing there regularly and serving as the hall’s Quartet-in-residence in the 2000-01 season.

In recent seasons the Brentano String Quartet has traveled widely, appearing all over the United States and Canada, in Europe, Japan and Australia.

It has performed in the world’s most prestigious venues, including Carnegie Hall and Alice Tully Hall in New York; the Library of Congress in Washington; the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam; the Konzerthaus in Vienna; Suntory Hall in Tokyo; and the Sydney Opera House.

The 2009-2010 Washington College Concert Series will continue with performances by lutist Richard Stone in the Hotchkiss Recital Hall on November 1, the Gemini Piano Trio in Gibson’s grand new Decker Theatre on January 23, and, also in Decker, the Lyric Brass Quintet on February 27 and pianist Inna Faliks on March 28.

Season tickets are available for $50 per person in advance or at the box office on performance nights. Single admission tickets, available at the box office on performance nights, are $15 for adults, $5 for youth 18 and under. For more information, call 410/778-7839.