Smithsonian Chamber Music Society audiences are privy to the unparalleled experience of being able to hear two magnificent quartets of instruments—one made by Antonio Stradivari, the other by his teacher Nicoló Amati—in this popular three-concert series on Saturdays.
The Axelrod Quartet—Marc Destrubé (violin), James Dunham (viola), Kenneth Slowik (violoncello), and now includes violinist Mark Fewer—presents three programs, each of which is anchored by one of Schubert’s last quartets.
Works of quartet masters Haydn, Beethoven, and Shostakovich are joined by three 20th-century works related, in their diversity, to varied interests of the National Museum of American History. Much of the music of African American composer Florence Price was rediscovered only in 2009. Her Quartet in G Major, a work from 1929, recalls the harmonic language of Antonín Dvorák, who prophesized, "In the Negro melodies of America I discover all that is needed for a great and noble school of music.”
The music of the Argentinian Osvaldo Golijov, resident in the United States since 1986, has been characterized as “forcing us to look and listen in a way that we're not asked to do inside other music, speaking to the divisiveness and coming together of cultures.” The Austrian American Erich Wolfgang Korngold is probably most widely known for the nearly two dozen Hollywood film scores he wrote in the 1930s, ’40s, and ’50s (among them The Adventures of Robin Hood, for which he won the Academy Award in 1934), but many of his operas, orchestral and chamber works, songs, and piano pieces employ the same appealingly kaleidoscopic harmonic palette.
Special Note: Saturday concerts include a pre-concert lecture at 6:30 p.m. unless noted.
Concert Season Repertoire
Saturday, December 9, 2024, 3:30 p.m. (Rescheduled to Afternoon, Pre-concert lecture at 2:30 p.m.)
Florence Price: String Quartet in G Major
Ludwig van Beethoven: Quartet in E-flat Major, Op. 74, the Harp
Franz Schubert: Quartet in A Minor, D804, Rosamunde
Saturday, April 6, 2024, 7:30 p.m.
Joseph Haydn: Quartet in F Minor, Op. 20, No. 5
Erich Wolfgang Korngold: Quartet No. 2 in E-Flat Major, Op. 26
Franz Schubert: Quartet in D Minor, D810, Death and the Maiden
Saturday, April 27, 2024, 7:30 p.m.
Osvoldo Golijov: Tenebrae for String Quartet
Dmitri Shostakovich: Quartet No. 7
Franz Schubert: Quartet in G Major, D887
3 concerts
General Information
- All concerts will be held in person at Nicholas and Eugenia Taubman Hall of Music, National Museum of American History at 14th St. and Constitution Ave. NW, Washington, DC.
- This series is also available on Sundays. Note that the Sunday series does not include pre-concert lectures.
- If you are interested in additional Smithsonian Chamber Music Society in-person concert series, check out these 2023-2024 season options:
- Refer to our health and safety information for in-person programs.
