March 8, 2007

Festival of Fours begins

QuadroMania: A Festival of Fours (March 28 to April 7) -- the School of Music’s Spring 2007 festival -- will present compelling combinations of fours to showcase some of today’s brightest artists.

Music will vary from classical, new and world music to acoustic, fusion, harmony, instrumental, jazz, rock, swing and percussion, to appeal to all ages.

All of the QuadroMania music festival events are open to the public and will be held at Pick-Staiger Concert Hall.

The festival’s nine events will include performances by the Juilliard String Quartet (March 28), the Turtle Island String Quartet (March 30) and Turtle Island with the Ying Quartet (March 31). The Wacker Consort — a quartet of string bassists from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (April 4) will be joined by School of Music faculty members and their student protégées. Also taking the stage will be the edgy New York–based new music string quartet Ethel with special guest Howard Levy (April 5) and Chicago guitarists Fareed Haque, Chris Siebold and Friends (April 6). The festival’s finale will feature four percussion groups — Samba Samba!, Boomshaka, the Kaotic Drumline and Be the Groove — that will entertain the audience with Brazilian martial arts dancing, rhythmic percussion and drumming.

Live theatre organ music will provide the background sounds during the screening of the 1921 silent film classic “The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse” (March 29), a wartime romance starring Rudolf Valentino and Alice Terry. Turtle Island will present a master class (March 31) that will explore classical and popular forms of rhythm.

> Get detailed program information and tickets at www.pickstaiger.com or by calling (847) 467-4000.