ABOUT THE FESTIVAL
This year’s festival highlights Kronos’ commitment to creative collaboration, an inclusive repertoire, and to deep, longstanding relationships with artists from around the globe. The three-day celebration features five world premieres; signature works from Kronos’ far-reaching repertoire; an anniversary celebration; and three compositions commissioned as part of Kronos’ groundbreaking Fifty for the Future: The Kronos Learning Repertoire project. Composer, arranger, and trombonist Jacob Garchik, who has a long and fruitful artistic relationship with the ensemble, is this year’s Artist-in-Residence.
This year’s world premiere works are by Hawa Kassé Mady Diabaté, Jonathan Berger, inti figgis-vizueta, Mahsa Vahdat, and Soo Yeon Lyuh. Special guests include writer and performer Rinde Eckert, multi-instrumentalist Vân-Ánh Vanessa Võ, haegeum master Lyuh, vocalist Vahdat, and pipa virtuoso Wu Man.
“Kronos Festival celebrates expanding creativity,” says Kronos’ founder David Harrington. “We honor those who have a strengthened resolve to help shape our musical future in spite of any odds. Surrounded by friends, we hope the festival energizes our listeners. Live music can be a microcosm as we listen to the future unfolding.”
“I’ve had the tremendous privilege to work with Kronos Quartet for the last 16 years,” said Garchik. “Together we’ve created over 110 works of music from all over the world. I’ve always loved working behind the scenes and collaborating with a huge range of artists but am thrilled to have my own chance to step into the spotlight with Kronos Festival.”
PROGRAM
Thursday, April 7, 2022, Program #1, 7:30pm
Kronos Quartet with special guest Jacob Garchik
Kronos Festival kicks off on Thursday, April 7 with the world premiere of Janety, a joyful work by Malian Griot singer Hawa Kassé Mady Diabaté written for the 40th Anniversary of KPAA Executive Director and Kronos Manager Janet Cowperthwaite. A member of renowned ensemble Trio Da Kali, Diabaté’s work is inspired by the tegere tulon—a tradition of handclapping songs and dances created spontaneously by girls in country villages of southern Mali. Janety features a guest group of young musicians, and pays tribute to Kronos’ steadfast leader and advocate. Artist-in-Residence Jacob Garchik joins the quartet on trombone and tuba for Upon a Star, a suite arranged by Garchik based on the music of Steven Spielberg films. The program concludes with Cadenza on the Night Plain, a 13-movement work written for Kronos by one of the ensemble’s most prolific and creative collaborators, Terry Riley. Music critic Kyle Gann called Cadenza on the Night Plain “the archetypal Kronos piece.”
Friday, April 8, 2022, Program #2, 7:30pm
Kronos Quartet with special guests Rinde Eckert and Vân-Ânh Võ
On Friday, April 8, at 7:30pm Kronos unveils two of the latest works released as part of Fifty for the Future: The Kronos Learning Repertoire, an unprecedented string quartet commissioning, performance, education, and legacy project that has been designed and developed under Cowperthwaite’s leadership. The works include Indonesian Gamelan composer and vocalist Peni Candra Rini’s Maduswara, and Beninese singer-songwriter Angélique Kidjo’s YanYanKliYan Senamido #2. Also on the program are Oasis, a one-movement composition by Azerbaijani composer Franghiz Ali-Zadeh and one of Kronos’ signature works, and Flow, a haunting work by Laurie Anderson arranged by Jacob.
Concluding the program is the world premiere of My Lai Suite, adapted from composer Jonathan Berger and librettist Harriet Scott Chessman’s acclaimed opera about Hugh Thompson, the Army helicopter pilot in the Vietnam War who courageously intervened in the U.S. Army massacre of unarmed South Vietnamese civilians. Special guest vocalist Rinde Eckert and master instrumentalist Vân-Ánh Võ perform.
Saturday, April 9, 2022, Program #3, 7:30pm
Kronos Quartet with special guests Soo Yeon Lyuh, Mahsa Vahdat, and Wu Man
Program #3 closes Kronos Festival with three world premieres written for Kronos. inti figgis-vizueta’s music by yourself is a piece about “connecting to people who are and aren’t still here.” Iranian singer Mahsa Vahdat performs in Where Is Your Voice, a new, original song arranged by Aftab Darvishi. Korean-American composer and master of the haegeum Soo Yeon Lyuh takes the stage in Tattoo (Extended Version), the artist’s powerful response to a harrowing incident in Berkeley, California in which someone fired a gun at her car. Philip Glass’ Orion: China, written on the occasion of the Athens Cultural Olympiad in Summer 2004, contemplates the Earth’s relationship to the constellations as interpreted by the world’s many cultures, and features pipa virtuoso Wu Man.
The program also includes Russian nonagenarian composer Sofia Gubaidulina’s Quartet No. 4, one of Kronos’ signature works its vast body of commissions; and Jacob Garchik’s Storyteller, a 16-minute work featuring archival recordings of the legendary Pete Seeger singing, speaking, and playing his banjo. Storyteller was one of the works in Long Time Passing: Kronos Quartet and Friends Celebrate Pete Seeger, a tribute to the late folk musician and activist.
Saturday, April 9: Kronos Labs, 2pm and 5pm
Kronos Labs features a free performance at 2pm with student musicians from around the Bay Area performing works from Fifty for the Future, including several of Garchik’s arrangements. At 5pm, Garchik is joined by an all-star group composed of the Bay Area’s premier brass players for The Heavens: The Atheist Gospel Trombone Choir, a nine-part suite for trombones, tuba, and drums.
Ellen Reid SOUNDWALK in Golden Gate Park, Ongoing, Free
SOUNDWALK is a GPS-enabled work of public art that uses music, composed by Reid and performed by Kronos and others, to illuminate the natural environment. SOUNDWALK is custom-tailored to its setting, and has been created to encourage a deeper connection to nature and exploration of iconic spaces. Listeners access the work via a free smartphone app, and experience a dynamic sonic landscape meticulously mapped to the park’s landscape and attractions.