Bay Area-based Del Sol Quartet dives into their acclaimed Angel Island Project in new podcast, Releasing this June

San Francisco’s Del Sol Quartet will release the first season of their new podcast, Sounds Current on June 10. The podcast, hosted by founding Del Sol member Charlton Lee, follows the string quartet’s journey to shine light on San Francisco’s Angel Island, a site of detention for Chinese immigrants in the 1900s. By following the creation of the Angel Island Project, alongside several special guests, Del Sol explores how compassionate art enriches a community and can lead to a more hopeful future. Sounds Current is one of four podcasts nominated for the 2024 Tribeca Festival’s Independent Audio Nonfiction Award. The full episode will be available here upon release. 

Lee and Sounds Current producer, Andrea Klunder, from The Creative Impostor Studios, will preview the episode before its release at the Tribeca Festival’s Official Selection Previews (Nonfiction), hosted by The New Yorker’s Critics at Large on June 10 at 5:30 p.m. at AMC 19th St. East 6 (890 Broadway New York, NY). Tickets and more information can be found here. 

The Sounds Current podcast was inspired by the quartet’s commission of Huang Ruo’s ANGEL ISLAND – Oratorio, a haunting composition that weaves together a story of immigration, discrimination, and confinement on 20th century Angel Island, located in the San Francisco Bay. Between 1910 and 1940, as new immigrants flowed through Angel Island’s immigration station, Chinese immigrants faced massive discrimination because of America’s earliest racist immigration legislation– the Chinese Exclusion Act. Being held for sometimes years in brutal conditions at the detention center, many of these immigrants looked for solace by inscribing poetry onto the walls of the center. ANGEL ISLAND – Oratorio brought these poems to life with a poignant and powerful expression of history, hope, and humanity. The podcast traces from the journey from Del Sol Quartet’s premiere performances on Angel Island in 2021 to the most recent 2024 New York sold-out performances, produced by Beth Morrison Projects, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music. 

“We are a quartet that deeply cares about connecting with people through our music, making art that feels relevant to those around us,” said Del Sol Quartet member Kathryn Bates. “We invite people in, to be part of the process, to dialogue –as individuals, artists, collaborators, thinkers, organizations, communities. It becomes all our artwork, not just mine or yours. The Angel Island community has been working tirelessly for 40 years to bring this history to international attention. We are proud to add our music-making to this effort, letting it sing out more.” 

Sounds Current introduces the creative minds behind The Angel Island Project and invites listeners to explore what it means to create art that provokes awareness and builds community. Through intriguing conversations focused on the untold stories of the island, the quartet bridges a painful history and hopeful present, where community members are currently working to ensure these immigrants’, stories are not forgotten. 

Cellist Kathryn Bates, and violinists Benjamin Kreith and Hyeyung Sol Yoon serve as co-hosts of the podcast. Executive producers include Donald Fineberg and Andrea Fellows Finberg. 

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Season one guests include:? 

• Huang Ruo, Composer? 
• Ed Tepporn, Executive Director, Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation 
• Genny Lim, poet, co-author of? Island: Poetry and History of Chinese Immigrants on Angel Island 1910-1940, member of “The Last Hoisan Poets”, Angel Island descendant 
• Andi Wong, project coordinator #artsed4all, community coordinator for Angel Island Project, Angel Island Descendant 
• Casey Dexter-Lee, Angel Island State Park Interpreter 
• Sid Chen, vocalist from the 2021 premiere vocal ensemble, Volti 
• Emiko Ono, Director of the Performing Arts Program, William and Flora Hewlett Foundation 
• Susan Moffat, Creative Director, Future Histories Lab at University of California, Berkeley? 
• Senior Master Sergeant Taylor Armstrong, Enlisted Conductor, Pianist, and Superintendent of US Air Force Band Singing Sergeants 
• Matthew Ozawa, Director of New York premiere production of “ANGEL ISLAND” with Beth Morrison Projects as part of the Prototype Festival / Next Wave Festival co-produced by?Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM) 

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ABOUT DEL SOL QUARTET 

San Francisco’s Del Sol Quartet believes that music can, and should, happen anywhere -screaming out Aeryn Santillan’s Makeshift Memorials from a Mission District sidewalk or a rural high school, bouncing Ben Johnston’s microtonal Americana off the canyon walls of the Yampa River or the hallowed walls of Library of Congress, bringing Huang Ruo’s Angel Island Oratorio home to the island detention barracks or across the Pacific to the Singapore International Arts Festival. Del Sol’s performances provide the possibility for unexpected discovery, sparking dialogue and bringing people together. 

Since 1992, Del Sol has commissioned or premiered hundreds of works by composers including Terry Riley, Tania León, Frederic Rzewski, Vijay Iyer, Mason Bates, Pamela Z, Chinary Ung, Chen Yi, Andy Akiho, Erberk Eryilmaz, Theresa Wong, and Reza Vali. They especially value their ongoing relationship with the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music in Boonville, California. 

Huang Ruo - A Dust in Time, Del Sol’s eleventh album, was described in the New York Times as “excavations of beauty from the elemental.” New Del Sol recordings in 2023 include The Resonance Between, a collaboration with North Indian musicians Alam Khan & Arjun Verma, and SPELLLING and The Mystery School with Oakland magical-futurist pop phenomenon SPELLLING. ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????? 

delsolquartet.com 

@delsolquartet 

Benjamin Kreith & Hyeyung Sol Yoon, violins 
Charlton Lee, viola 
Kathryn Bates, cello 

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ABOUT THE CREATIVE IMPOSTER STUDIOS 

Andrea Klunder is the award-winning Producer and Story Editor, and founder behind The Creative Impostor Studios, a boutique production agency helping organizations, artists, and creative leaders curate their brand story and build reputation by crafting podcasts for cultural impact. Key Change for the Santa Fe Opera won two 2023 Signal Awards for Music Show and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Episode. Sounds Current for the Del Sol Quartet is a 2024 Official Selection at the Tribeca Audio Storytelling Festival.? 

As a teaching artist, Andrea’s podcasting program for neurodiverse high school students in Chicago won a Purple Star Award for instructional excellence and their show Power Your Story was a finalist in the 2019 Google Podcasts Creator Program.?  

The Creative Impostor Studios team consists of collaborators who combine a love of creative storytelling with technical expertise to leverage the audio medium on behalf of changemakers who want to break the status quo for net positive impact.? 
 

Team: 

Edwin R. Ruiz lends his skills in the role of Technical Producer. With decades of experience in IT combined with live stream, production, and post-production roles, Edwin created his own company, Mondo Machine, dedicated to facilitating artistic and nonprofit media projects. 

Alex Riegler, international business, technology & science journalist, is our Associate Producer, Editor and Podcast Manager. Lisa Widder is our resident blog and show notes writer. 

thecreativeimposter.com 

IG: @thecreativeimpostor 

LinkedIn: @andreaklunder 

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