The Ysaÿe String Quartet makes its area debut Saturday, March 3 at 8 p.m. in Memorial Chapel in a program that includes Haydn's Op. 76, No. 5 in D; Bartok's No. 6; and Debussy's Op. 10 in g.
The quartet features Guillaume Sutre and Luc-Marie Aguera, violin; Miguel da Silva, viola; and Yovan Markovitch, cello.
Formed in 1984 while the members were still students at the Paris Conservatoire, the Ysaÿe String Quartet took its name from violinist and composer Eugene Ysaÿe (1858–1931). Having played throughout the world including Suntory Hall in Tokyo and Carnegie Hall in New York, the quartet gained international recognition in 1988 for being the first French quartet to win the Grand Prix at the Evian International Competition.
The Ysaÿe Quartet's performances have been a catalyst for new works by Boucourechliev, Dusapin, Krawczyk, Monnet, Tanguy and Escaich. Earlier this year, the ensemble gave the first performances of a clarinet quintet by Friedrich Cerha with clarinettist Paul Meyer in Vienna and London.
The Ysaÿe Quartet founded a class for string quartets at the Conservatoire Supérieur de Paris in 1984. In 2003, the quartet founded its own recording label (Ysaÿe Records/Aeon), and its most recent releases feature repertoire by Haydn, Schumann, Mozart, Fauré and Magnard.
The quartet's discography includes recordings of works by Mozart, Mendelssohn, Debussy, Ravel and Fauré. The group is also undertaking a six-year project to perform the complete quartets by Haydn in Besançon as well as in Los Angeles.
Concert tickets are free for the Union community, $20 for the general public and $8 for area students. For more information, call 388-6080 or 372-3651; or visit http://www.union.edu/concertseries/.