The Vilar Performing Arts Center (VPAC) invites classical music lovers to experience the world-renowned string ensemble, the Takács Quartet on Saturday, January 10 at 6:30 PM. Recognized as one of the world’s great ensembles, the Takács Quartet plays with a unique blend of drama, warmth and humor, combining four distinct musical personalities to bring fresh insights to the string quartet repertoire. The evening’s program has been hand-crafted for the VPAC audience following the quartet’s debut in Beaver Creek last winter. It will showcase their brilliant musicianship and versatility, paired perfectly with the acoustic beauty of the hall. Takács will perform the works of Schubert: “Death and the Maiden” and Beethoven: Opus 59 No. 1. Tickets to the Takács Quartet are $50, with special $10 tickets for students (18 and under), and are on sale now at the VPAC Box Office at (970.845.8497/www.vilarpac.org). The VPAC is located under the ice rink in Beaver Creek Village (68 Avondale Lane, Beaver Creek, Colorado).
The Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest and has made sixteen award-winning recordings of works by Beethoven, Bartók, Borodin, Brahms, Chausson, Dvořák, Haydn, Mozart, Schubert and Smetana. Takács Quartet members are also Christoffersen Faculty Fellows at the University of Colorado Boulder.
In 2012, Gramaphone announced that the Takács Quartet was the only string quartet to be inducted into its first Hall of Fame, along with such legendary artists as Leonard Bernstein and Dame Janet Baker. And in May of 2014, they became the first string quartet to win the Wigmore Hall Medal.
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The Medal, inaugurated in 2007, recognizes major international artists who have a strong association with the Hall. Recipients so far include Andras Schiff, Thomas Quasthoff, Menachem Pressler and Dame Felicity Lott. Appointed in 2012 as the first-ever Associate Artists at Wigmore, the Takács Quartet presents six concerts every season.
Takács Quartet members include: Edward Dusinberre (first violin) English native whose career began as concertmaster of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain. He studied at the Royal College of Music in London and at the Juilliard School. Károly Schranz (second violin) was born in Budapest, his first musical experiences were listening to the Gypsy bands in restaurants. He began playing the violin at the age of four and went on to study at the Béla Bártok Secondary Music School and later the Franz Liszt Academy. Geraldine Walther (viola) is aFlorida native who studiedat the Manhattan School of Music and was Principal Violist of the San Francisco Symphony for 29 years, having previously served as assistant principal of the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Baltimore Symphony and the Miami Philharmonic. András Fejér (cello) was born into a musical family. His father was a cellist and conductor, and his mother was a pianist. Since an early age, his parents have held string quartet weekends, which, for the young cellist were the most memorable of occasions.
This coming season the Takács Quartet will perform twice at Lincoln Center, and will also perform Philip Roth’s “Everyman” program with Meryl Streep at Princeton. This program was first performed in 2007 at Carnegie Hall with the late Philip Seymour Hoffman. In Europe they perform at the Edinburgh and Bath Festivals, the Louvre in Paris, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, Vienna’s Musikverein, London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall, and in Geneva, Florence, Cremona and Budapest.
Tickets to the Takács Quartet are $50, with special $10 tickets for students (18 and under), and are on sale now at the VPAC Box Office at (970.845.8497/www.vilarpac.org). The VPAC is located under the ice rink in Beaver Creek Village (68 Avondale Lane, Beaver Creek, Colorado).