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'Quartet for the End of Time' next up in Classical Music Fest
GREENCASTLE -- Three DePauw music professors will be joined by violinist Allison Guest Edberg at 7:30 p.m. tonight for a performance of Olivier Messiaen's "Quartet for the End of Time" as the Greencastle Summer Classical Music Festival continues in the sanctuary of Greencastle's Gobin Memorial United Methodist Church.
Free festival concerts are presented every Wednesday evening through August, with expenses underwritten through donations from individuals and local businesses.
Pianist Katya Kramer-Lapin, clarinetist Randy Salman, and cellist Eric Edberg, each a School of Music faculty member, form the rest of the unusual quartet for the legendary Messiaen work.
"Messiaen was interred in a German prisoner of war camp when he composed this famous famous piece," festival director Eric Edberg said. The title of the work comes from the Book of Revelation, with the work dedicated, "in homage to the Angel of the Apocalypse, who raises a hand towards Heaven saying: 'There shall be time no longer.'"
Messiaen, who was a deeply religious Roman Catholic, based many of his compositions on religious and mystical themes. The 50-minute, 8-movement work will be the only piece performed at the concert. The performers will briefly explain the piece and Messiaen's unique musical language, which was based on bird songs, rhythms from ancient Greece and India, and unusual harmonies and scales. After playing the first four movements, there will be a short intermission and then the rest of the work will be performed.
Allison Guest Edberg is a member of Olde Friends, Ensemble Galilei, ViVaCe, Ensemble Voltaire, the Mirabel Classical Quartet, and is concertmaster of the Indianapolis Baroque Orchestra.
An accomplished performer of both jazz and classical music, Randy Salman has worked professionally with the Indianapolis Symphony and Chamber orchestras, David Baker, Gunther Schuller, Quincy Jones, Tony Bennett, Joe Williams, Clark Terry, Louis Bellson and many others.
An active solo recitalist and chamber music collaborator, Katya Kramer-Lapin enjoys performing internationally. Her venues include appearances at the UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, Moscow Conservatory Hall, major concert halls in Germany and Eastern Europe, as well as a concert tour to Taiwan.
Eric Edberg attended the North Carolina School of the Arts, the Juilliard School, SUNY Stony Brook and Florida State University, and studied with Gary Hoffman, Denis Brott, Stephen Kates, Leonard Rose and Bernard Greenhouse.