*********************************
Acclaimed as America’s premier postclassical string quartet, ETHEL boldly infuses contemporary concert music with fierce intensity, questioning the boundaries between performer and audience, tradition and technology. Formed in 1998, New York’s high-octane ETHEL is comprised of Juilliard-trained performers Cornelius Dufallo (violin), Ralph Farris (viola), Dorothy Lawson (cello) and Mary Rowell (violin).
ETHEL performs adventurous music of the past four decades, with emphasis on works composed since 1995. Their repertoire includes compositions by quartet members as well as Julia Wolfe, Phil Kline, David Lang, John Zorn, Steve Reich, Jacob TV, David Lang, Scott Johnson, Don Byron, Marcello Zarvos, Evan Ziporyn, and Mary Ellen Childs. Embracing today’s most exhilarating music, ETHEL has performed with Joe Jackson, Kurt Elling, Bang on a Can, Todd Rundgren, Ursula Oppens, Loudon Wainwright III, STEW, Ensemble Modern, Joshua Fried, Iva Bittová, Colin Currie, Steve Coleman, Stephen Gosling, and Polygraph Lounge. ETHEL has also worked with dance companies and with choreographers including Wally Cardona, Annie-B Parson, and Mathew Janczewski.
ETHEL tours the world, appearing on stages as varied as Venice Biennale, Sydney Opera House, Ravinia, TED, Lincoln Center, Holland’s TROMP Festival, Kennedy Center, FIAC in Guanajuato, Mexico, and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Highlights of the 2008-09 season included: world premiere of Phil Kline’s SPACE at the gala reopening of Alice Tully Hall; world premiere of ETHEL's TruckStop®: The Beginning at BAM’s Next Wave Festival; world premiere of RADIO by Osvaldo Golijov at the debut of WNYC Radio’s Jerome L. Greene Space; world premiere of WAIT FOR GREEN with choreography by Annie-B Parson, commissioned by the World Financial Center; a new collaboration with Arena Dances at the Southern Theater in Minneapolis; world premiere of an original live film score at Celebrate Brooklyn!; TROMP Festival with Colin Currie and Todd Rundgren; Jazz at Lincoln Center’s Allen Room and the Grand Canyon Music Festival, where ETHEL is Ensemble-in-Residence with the Native American Composers Apprenticeship Project.
ETHEL has released four albums since their debut recording, the self-titled ETHEL (Cantaloupe Music, 2003), which was named Billboard’s “Best Album” for that year. The group’s next recording, Light (Cantaloupe Music, 2006), was selected as 3 on Amazon.com’s “Best of 2006: Top Classical Editor’s Picks.” The group has played as guest artist on a dozen music labels and was recently featured with vocal group Lionheart on John the Revelator: A Mass for Six Voices by Phil Kline (Cantaloupe, Music, 2008). For more info, visit http://www.ethelcentral.com.
*********************************
