Amernet String Quartet - Bernard Rands String Quartet #2

The Amernet String Quartet was in concert on Tuesday, September 9, 2025 at Marc A. Scorca Hall at The National Opera Center in Manhattan, performing Bernard Rands' String Quartet #2.

The program was repeated on September 10 at Queens Botanical Garden in Flushing, and on Thursday, September 11 at Port Washington Public Library in Port Washington on Long Island.

These concerts were presented in cooperation with The Steven Gerber Trust.

Through a catalog of more than a hundred published works and many recordings, Bernard Rands is established as a major figure in contemporary music. Born in Sheffield, England in 1934 his 80th birthday has been marked internationally by upward of one hundred concert performances, radio and television broadcasts of his music. Rands emigrated to the United States in 1975, becoming an American citizen in 1983. He was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters in 2004 and into the Illinois Lincoln Academy in 2014.

A dedicated and passionate teacher, Rands has been guest composer at many international festivals and Composer in Residence at the Aspen and Tanglewood festivals. Rands is the Walter Bigelow Rosen Professor Emeritus Harvard. He has received honorary degrees from several American and European universities.

Rands lives in Chicago with his wife, composer Augusta Read Thomas. Visit him at http://www.bernardrands.com/.

Praised for their "intelligence" and “immensely satisfying” playing by the New York Times, the Amernet String Quartet has garnered recognition as one of today's exceptional string quartets and are Ensemble-in-Residence at Florida International University in Miami. Their sound has been called “complex” but with an “old world flavor.” Strad Magazine described the Amernet as “...a group of exceptional ability.”

The Amernet's performance schedule has taken the quartet across the Americas and to Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. They have collaborated with many of today's most prominent artists and ensembles including the Tokyo and Ying quartets as well as Shmuel Ashkenasi, Roberto Diaz, Gary Hoffman, Ida Kavafian, Anthony McGill, Joseph Kalichstein, Sherrill Milnes, and Michael Tree.

Members are violinists Misha Vitenson and Avi Nagin, violist Michael Klotz and cellist Jason Calloway. Much more about them at https://www.amernetquartet.com/about.