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Press Releases
Verona Quartet Wins Cleveland Quartet Award
Verona Quartet Wins Cleveland Quartet Award
The Quartet is New England Conservatory’s Preparatory School Quartet-in-Residence
For Immediate Release—New England Conservatory (NEC) announces that Chamber Music America (CMA), the national network for ensemble music professionals, has selected the Verona Quartet, in residence at the NEC Preparatory School, to receive the Cleveland Quartet Award for the 2020–21 and 2021–22 seasons.
Established in 1995, the biennial award honors and promotes a rising young string quartet whose artistry demonstrates that it is in the process of establishing a major career. “We are pleased that the Verona Quartet will join the roster of distinguished quartets that have received the Cleveland Quartet Award over the years—Brentano, Borromeo, Miami, Pacifica, Miró, Jupiter, Parker, Jasper, Ariel, Dover, and Rolston Quartets—all of which have enriched the chamber music field,” said Margaret M. Lioi, Chamber Music America’s chief executive officer.
The Verona Quartet—Jonathan Ong and Dorothy Ro (violins), Abigail Rojansky (viola) and Jonathan Dormand (cello)—graduated from NEC's Professional String Quartet Program in spring of 2019. The program is directed by Paul Katz. The Quartet continues to work with NEC's Preparatory School as Quartet-in-Residence.
The Quartet rose to international prominence by sweeping top prizes at competitions across four continents, including the Wigmore Hall, Melbourne, Osaka, and M-Prize International Competitions, and performing at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, and Melbourne Recital Hall. Recipients of the 2015 Concert Artists Guild Competition, the Quartet has demonstrated its commitment to interdisciplinary collaboration by partnering with Brooklyn’s Dance Heginbotham, traditional Emirati poets in the UAE, the folk supergroup, I’m With Her, and cellist Joshua Roman. The Quartet has commissioned works from composers Julia Adolphe, Sebastian Currier, Richard Danielpour, and Michael Gilbertson, whose Quartet was a finalist for the 2018 Pulitzer Prize in Music.
Forthcoming album releases include Gilbertson’s Quartet, as well as the ensemble’s debut album, Diffusion on Azica Records. The Quartet currently serves as the inaugural Quartet-in-Residence with North Carolina’s Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle, as Quartet-in-Residence for the Indiana University Summer String Academy, and New England Conservatory Preparatory School.
As part of the award, the quartet will be presented by: the Buffalo Chamber Music Society (Buffalo, NY); Carnegie Hall (New York, NY); Chamber Music Society of Detroit (Detroit, MI); Freer and Sackler Galleries of Art at the Smithsonian (Washington, D.C.); Friends of Chamber Music (Kansas City, MO); Market Square Concerts (Harrisburg, PA); Krannert Center at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (Urbana, IL); and the University of Texas at Austin (Austin, TX).
As a culmination of its remarkable 26-year history, the Cleveland Quartet sought to envision a lasting legacy for young musicians. The group joined forces with CMA and the eight presenters listed above to raise funds for the establishment of the Cleveland Quartet Award Endowment Fund. Nominations for the award are submitted confidentially to CMA by a national roster of chamber musicians, presenters, and educators. The winning string quartet’s performances are funded, in part, by income from the Cleveland Quartet Award Endowment Fund, which is administered by CMA.
About New England Conservatory
New England Conservatory (NEC) is recognized internationally as a leader among music schools, educating and training musicians of all ages from around the world for over 150 years. With 800 music students representing more than 40 countries in the College, and 2,000 youth and adults who study in the Preparatory and Continuing Education divisions, NEC cultivates a diverse, dynamic community for students, providing them with performance opportunities and high-caliber training with internationally-esteemed artist-teachers and scholars. NEC’s alumni, faculty and students touch nearly every aspect of musical life in the region; NEC is a major engine of the vital activity that makes Boston a musical and cultural capital. With the recent appointment of Andrea Kalyn to serve as NEC’s 17th President, the Conservatory is poised to embark on a new chapter at the forefront of innovation in education and music. https://necmusic.edu
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