Hamilton College Performing Arts opens the fall series with the St. Lawrence String Quartet, featuring Utica native Christopher Costanza, cello, on Saturday, Sept. 15, at 7:30 p.m., in Wellin Hall, Schambach Center.
The program will include Franz Josef Haydn’s String Quartet in C Major, Op. 33, No.3 (“The Bird”), Alban Bergs String Quartet, Op. 3, and Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s String Quartet No. 3 in E-flat minor, Op. 30.
Established in Toronto in 1989, the St. Lawrence String Quartet quickly earned acclaim at top international chamber music competitions and was soon playing hundreds of concerts per year worldwide. They established an ongoing residency at Spoleto Festival USA, made prize-winning recordings for EMI of music by Schumann, Tchaikovsky, and Golijov, earning two Grammy nominations and a host of other prizes before becoming the ensemble-in-residence at Stanford University in 1999.
The quartet is Geoff Nuttall, violin; Owen Dalby, violin; Lesley Robertson, viola; and Christopher Costanza, cello.
Utica-born Christopher Costanza joined the St. Lawrence String Quartet in 2003, and tours extensively with that ensemble, performing over 100 concerts annually throughout the world. As a member of the St. Lawrence, he is an Artist in Residence at Stanford University, where he teaches cello and chamber music and performs a wide variety of formal and informal concerts each season, from the stages of the University’s concert halls to student residence hall and lecture halls.
Tickets are $20 for adults, $15 for senior citizens and $5 for students. All seats are general admission. For tickets or information call the box office at (315) 859-4331 or visit www.hamilton.edu/performingarts.