National String Quartet Foundation Upcoming events

 

Dear Subscribers, PIROSMANI QUARTET TENDERNESS AND TURMOIL TOUR THIS WEEK From Tuesday, acclaimed Cork violinist Mairéad Hickey brings together colleagues from Brazil, Ukraine and the USA for a third tour by the Pirosmani Quartet, presenting music by Schumann, Schubert and Jane O'Leary in Rosscarbery, Listowel, Cork, Sligo, Navan and Dublin Pirosmani Quartet Mairéad Hickey & William Hagen, violins Natanael Ferreira, viola Oleksey Shadrin, cello You can read about the quartet members here: https://nsqf.ie/pirosmani2026 You can watch their incredible 2024 performance of Dvorak's G major quartet at MTU Cork School of Music on youtube - click here Click on your venue for bookings: ROSSCARBERY - Tuesday 3rd November at 8pm - St. Fachtna’s Cathedral - presented by Barrahane Music LISTOWEL - Wednesday 4th November at 8pm - St. John’s Theatre and Arts Centre CORK - Thursday 5th November at 7.30pm - MTU Cork School of Music - presented by Cork Orchestral Society SLIGO - Friday 6th November at 7.30pm - The Model - presented by Con Brio NAVAN - Saturday 7th November at 8pm - Solstice Arts Centre DUBLIN - Sunday 8th November at 3pm - National Concert Hall The concert programme is available for download here. ABOUT THE MUSIC Schumann - String Quartet in F major Op.41 No.2 [1842] Jane O’Leary - ebb and flow of endless motion [2026] † Schubert - String Quartet in G major D.887 [2026] † First performances They open with the second of the three vividly expressive string quartets that Schumann wrote in a frenzy of creativity in the early summer of 1842. The previous September, his wife Clara - apart from Liszt, the most famous pianist of their time - had given birth to their first child, and perhaps that is the inspiration behind the disarming lullaby themes of the first two movements and the mischievous scampering of the scherzo and finale. Galway-based composer Jane O’Leary has written a new quartet for the Pirosmani Quartet to present on this tour. She writes: This quartet movement is inspired by the gentle, undulating motion of the sea and reflects the recurring surges of movement, the sparkling of the sun on the surface, the mysterious depths of the ocean, the foam rising with the waves and falling again against the shore, the endless motion of the sea.  The title is a fragment from the poetry of American writer Walt Whitman and can be taken to represent the nature of life itself, as well as music - never standing still. Schubert’s vast G major quartet D.887 is a work of symphonic scale and emotional extremity. Like much of Schubert’s music in the last years of his short life it revolves around conflict between grief and joy, darkness and light, restless angst and sublime lyricism, often expressed through abrupt switching from major to minor or by the juxtaposition of music of near brutality with moments of great tenderness. This wonderful work is one of the greats, highly recommended! COMING UP November 13-15 -  Vanbrugh & Friends play Brahms and Dvořák in Cork, Wexford and Bantry November 19-24 - Gealán Quartet plays in Carrick-on-Shannon, Birr, Cork, Dublin and Castleconnell See NSQF.ie for details WHATSAPP COMMUNITY Update... there's a steady stream of signups to our community so we expect to start using it in the coming weeks. If you are a member of a Whatsapp group focussed on chamber music, and if you have the agreement of its members, it is also an option to propose that group for addition to our community. Click here for signup page NSQF exists to bring great music to you wherever you are in Ireland and to that end we would like to be able to reach out to you all in the most convenient and effective way to let you know about upcoming concerts This email list works quite well, but we are all swamped by emails and they can sometimes disappear into other folders and not get read at all. So we would like to see if our new Whatsapp Community might help, alongside the emails. Its not a chat forum, it only exists to bring you announcements of upcoming NSQF concerts, and possibly other closely related chamber music news. Your details will not be visible to other members of the community, unless you already know them. Please consider trying it out by clicking the link here, it is easy to leave if it doesn’t suit you. We won't start using it unless there are substantial numbers signed up. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Thanks and sincere appreciation to our funders, sponsors and co-presenters, the Arts Council, RTÉ Lyric FM, the National Concert Hall, University College, Cork, MTU Cork School of Music, Cork City Council, Cork County Council, many private donors, and all the venues and promoters we work with around the country.  with best wishes, Chris