In fall 2008 Kronos Quartet continues its multi-year residency at the Center with programs that navigate the landscape of war.

The journey begins on October 30 with a concert including two works that peer fearlessly into the heart of darkness: George Crumb's Black Angels and Aleksandra Vrebalov's ... hold me, neighbor, in this storm... The program will also include Derek Charke's Cercle du Nord III and the North American premiere of Giorgos Koumendakis' Point of No Return.  Click here for performance details.

On November 2, the quartet joins activist Diane Wilson and radio host/writer David Barsamian in Alternative Radio: A New World is Possible, a dialogue in words and music. Where does our impulse for conflict lead us? What does it do to us, collectively and individually? What can we do to create a different reality? The musical selections and the conversation prompted by the music create an in-the-moment snapshot of possible responses, illuminated by the participants' ideas and experiences.  Click here for performance details.

Kronos Quartet

David Harrington, violin / John Sherba, violin / Hank Dutt, viola / Jeffrey Zeigler, cello
In 1973, David Harrington was inspired to form Kronos Quartet after hearing George Crumb's Black Angels, a highly unorthodox work featuring bowed water glasses, spoken word passages, and electronic effects... [read more]

George Crumb's Black Angels: "in tempore belli"

Written in 1970, George Crumb's anti-war Black Angels is a hauntingly ritualistic piece that has become known as the "Vietnam Quartet" – written, as the composer says, in a time of war, "in tempore belli."  [read more]

Aleksandra Vrebalov: ...hold me, neighbor, in this storm...

Aleksandra Vrebalov's ...hold me, neighbor, in this storm... is infused with the immediate sense of history at the very core of Balkan culture... [read more]

Diane Wilson: An Unreasonable Woman

A fifth-generation Texas shrimper, Diane Wilson never planned to change the world. She just wanted to clean up the water in her beloved Lavaca Bay. Her stubborn insistence in tackling an international corporate polluter propelled her into a national role... [read more]

David Barsamian and Alternative Radio

David Barsamian is renowned for "blasting his artful vocabulary and cutting critical analysis into the ether" (Mendocino Beacon) over Alternative Radio, a weekly one-hour public affairs program offered free to all public radio stations in the U.S., Canada, Europe, South Africa, Australia, and on short-wave on Radio for Peace International... [read more]