Kronos Quartet discography

The discography of the Kronos Quartet includes 43 studio albums, two compilations, five soundtracks, and 29 contributions to other artists' records. The Kronos Quartet (often referred to as "Kronos" or "The Kronos") plays contemporary classical music and was founded in 1973 by violinist David Harrington. Since 1978, they are based in San Francisco, California. Since 1985, the quartet's music has been released on Nonesuch Records.

Early recordings by the quartet contain contemporary classical music and adaptations of more popular music, such as jazz and rock and roll. Since the 1980s, and especially with the release of Cadenza on the Night Plain, written as a collaboration between composer Terry Riley and the quartet, much of the quartet's repertoire and album releases contain music written especially for them, by composers such as Terry Riley, Kevin Volans, Henryk Górecki, and Ástor Piazzolla. Their music "covers a who's who of 20th century-composers", as one critic noted in 1998.

Kronos Quartet

The Kronos Quartet is an American string quartet based in San Francisco. They have been in existence with a rotating membership of musicians for over forty years. The quartet specializes in contemporary and new music, with more than 750 works having been written for them.

History

The quartet was founded by violinist David Harrington in Seattle, Washington. Its first performance was in November 1973. Since 1978, the quartet has been based in San Francisco, California. The longest-running combination of performers (from 1978 to 1999) had Harrington and John Sherba on violin, Hank Dutt on viola, and Joan Jeanrenaud on cello. In 1999, Joan Jeanrenaud left Kronos because she was "eager for something new"; she was replaced by Jennifer Culp who, in turn, left in 2005 and was replaced by Jeffrey Zeigler. In June 2013, Zeigler was replaced by Sunny Yang. With almost forty studio albums to their credit and having performed worldwide, they were called "probably the most famous 'new music' group in the world" and were praised in philosophical studies of music for the inclusiveness of their repertoire.

Kronos Quartet (album)

Kronos Quartet is a studio album by the Kronos Quartet, the first of their albums on Nonesuch Records. It contains compositions by Australian composer Peter Sculthorpe, Finnish composer Aulis Sallinen, American composer Philip Glass, and American/Mexican composer Conlon Nancarrow. The last track is Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze."

Track listing

Critical reception

According to John Rockwell of the New York Times, "The best recorded anthology yet to capture the heady diversity of musical idioms that this San Francisco quartet espouses."Joseph McLellan, for the Washington Post, commented in a similar vein: "This group is absolutely amazing-not merely because of the superb technique with which it tackles the challenging contemporary repertoire, but even more for the breadth of vision that matter-of-factly and quite correctly includes Jimi Hendrix. . . . Hearing this music is a mind-expanding experience."

Credits

Musicians