This single movement for string quartet was written for a reading session by the MIVOS Quartet during their brief residency at SUNY Fredonia in September 2012. I was experimenting with form as well as style. The Classical quartet as well as the post-war avant garde were my two main influences. In the process of writing the quartet, I began to think of this disparate combination as Haydn-meets-Penderecki; the Father of the string quartet at odds with the genre’s outer limits.

The piece was performed and recorded by a wonderful quartet from Fredonia. Thanks to Stephen Minor, Giovanna Ruggiero, Chelsea Hadden, and John Chatterton for wonderful performances and to Tim Bausch for producing such an excellent recording.

Program Note:

“Edification” presents two closely related themes, in unstable incarnations at first. Parts of each of these themes are abstracted and explored to their limits before being reconstructed. Having gained a new strength from the disarray they have experienced, the themes are now able to stand on their own as well as coexist in a meaningful way.