Menachem Wiesenberg - Quintet for Percussion and String Quartet

Quintet for Percussion and String Quartet
Menachem Wiesenberg

״חמישיה לכלי הקשה ורביעיית מיתרים״
מוסיקה מקורית: מנחם ויזנברג

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Brian Calhoon, percussion
The Borromeo String Quartet
Nicholas Kitchen, violin
Kristopher Tong, violin
Mai Motobuchi, viola
Yeesun Kim, cello
Fenway Center, Northeastern University; October 18, 2014
Produced by Brian Dixon

The Quintet for Percussion & String Quartet is a chamber version of the Concertino for percussion & orchestra commissioned by the Israel Chamber Orchestra for the percussion artist Chen Zimbalista. Despite its origins, it has the distinct nature of a chamber work: the stirngs are equal partners throughout, the only exception being a semi-composed semi-improvised solo cadence for the percussionist.
Of the percussive instruments, the marimba is most prevalent, but various other instruments – with or without definite pitch – such as the vibraphone, cymbals and tam-tams, are also used. The Quintet, to be played as a continuous sequence, is of three sections, whose time ratios are arranged telescopically. The first is the longest and most complicated of the three, and ends with a cadence leading to the shorter expressive and lyrical second section, in which the strings come to the fore. Robust rhythmic qualities and a lively, bouncy tempo in the perpetuum mobile vain, characterize the third, even shorter, section which concludes the piece.(composer Notes)