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Indianapolis Quartet presents “Secrets from the Masters”

The Indianapolis Quartet will present its second concert of the season featuring some of western music’s most important works of art.

Debut performance of the faculty artist series String Quartet in the Ruth Lilly Performance Hall on November 7, 2016. Quartet is composed of Zachary DePue, violin; Austin Hrtman, violin; Austin Huntington, cello; and Michael Strauss, viola. (Photo by D. Todd Moore, University of Indianapolis) [1]
Debut performance of the faculty artist series String Quartet in the Ruth Lilly Performance Hall on November 7, 2016. (Photo by D. Todd Moore, University of Indianapolis)

The concert will be held at 7:30 p.m. on Monday, March 6, 2017, at the Ruth Lilly Performance Hall in the Christel DeHaan Fine Arts Center on the University of Indianapolis campus. Concert admission is free, although registration is required.

The performance opens with the soaring lyricism of Haydn’s “Lark” Quartet, followed by the powerful yet brief Seventh String Quartet by Dmitri Shostakovich, written in 1960 in the former Soviet Union. The evening culminates with Mark Kosower of the Cleveland Orchestra joining the Quartet for a performance of the richly romantic “Cello Quintet” by Franz Schubert, his final complete work written in 1828.

Since the Indianapolis Quartet’s debut in April 2016, Austin Hartman, second violinist of the Quartet and assistant professor of violin in the Department of Music at the University of Indianapolis, said the group has created an “exciting fusion of four distinct personalities meriting the most dynamic musical interpretations.”

The University and the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra collaborated to form the Quartet. Hartman is joined by Quartet co-founders Zachary De Pue, concertmaster of the ISO on violin, Michael Strauss, former principal violist for the ISO and Austin Huntington, principal cellist of the ISO. Special guest cellist and renowned recitalist Mark Kosower joins the Quartet for the performance.

The event is part of the University’s Faculty Concert Series, sponsored by Katz, Sapper and Miller. Ruth Lilly Performance Hall, a Viennese-style performance hall housed in the Christel DeHaan Fine Arts Center on the University of Indianapolis, has hosted thousands of world-class performers since being built in 1994.

“The Schubert ‘Cello Quintet’ in C Major is one of the great pieces of the string repertoire that the quartet wanted to play this season. We all agreed that Mark would be a great person for this project, and we are excited that he will be joining us for this collaboration,” said Hartman.

The Quartet’s program represents the delicate balance of choosing works from each quartet member’s wish list while providing the audience with a varied program of composers and styles, Hartman said.

Hartman said “Secrets from the Masters” with the Indianapolis Quartet promises to be an “exciting evening with the musicians on the stage who are working together as a team to communicate some of the most intimate and expressive thoughts of these three composers.”

The Quartet’s November performance was a standing room-only event, and Hartman said the group is appreciative of the community’s overwhelming support.

“We are excited to be a part of the rich history of performances from the Faculty Concert Series at the University of Indianapolis and we are looking forward to sharing our program next Monday evening that is designed to appeal to both the chamber music aficionado as well as those taking a first look at classical music,” he said.