# What do you think about the Kronos Quartet?



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

What do you think of the Kronos Quartet? Are they sell-outs, too commercial? Trend setters?

Are they cutting-edge, exploring and expanding Classical music's standings in the marketplace? Are they redefining CM's image and methodology?

Is their playing actually good? What about their choice of repertoire?

Are they worthy of real respect? Are they respected? Do you respect them?

Why are they popular? Because they're marketed well, or simply for sales figures? Should they be taken seriously, or written-off as commercial hacks?


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Commercial hacks! I saw the bunch of them walking to the bank the other day. They were going slowly because they were dragging along HUGE sacks of money. For shame, Kronos Quartet!


----------



## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

Love them. Always have, always will. Their exploration of modern repertoire is exemplary.


----------



## ahammel (Oct 10, 2012)

I'm not that familiar with them. I own _Ghost Opera_, which is pretty well composed and played but very jarring.

I'm not sure i understand the complaint that they're too commercial. To judge from their discography, the focus on the 20th and 21at centuries almost to exclusion, and are fond of commissioning new works from relatively obscure composers. That doesn't exactly scream 'box office gold' to me.


----------



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

ahammel said:


> I'm not that familiar with them. I own _Ghost Opera_, which is pretty well composed and played but very jarring.


Jack Nicholson: "You can't *HANDLE* Tan Dun!"



ahammel said:


> I'm not sure i understand the complaint that they're too commercial. To judge from their discography, the focus on the 20th and 21at centuries almost to exclusion, and are fond of commissioning new works from relatively obscure composers. That doesn't exactly scream 'box office gold' to me.


Well, they single-handedly launched Górecki into international acclaim; as Ken OC said, they have sold a lot of product; they did an arrangement of Jimi Hendrix' Purple Haze; they did an Astor Piazzola tango album; they eschew tuxedos, as their hairstyles and clothing, in cover photos, has been trendy; 
What other horrible infractions of classical decorum could one want?

They are (shudder) cross-genre! According to WIK:
Kronos covers a very broad range of musical genres: Mexican folk, experimental, pre-classical early music, movie soundtracks (Requiem for a Dream, Heat, The Fountain), jazz and tango. Kronos has also recorded adaptations of Jimi Hendrix's "Purple Haze", Sigur Rós's "Flugufrelsarinn", Television's "Marquee Moon", Raymond Scott's "Dinner Music for a Pack of Hungry Cannibals", and Bob Dylan's "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right".

Kronos has also worked with a variety of global musicians, including Bollywood playback singer Asha Bhosle; Mexican-American painter Gronk; American soprano Dawn Upshaw; jazz composer/performer Pat Metheny; Mexican rockers Café Tacuba; Azerbaijani mugam singer Alim Qasimov; and the Romanian gypsy band Taraf de Haïdouks among others.

Kronos has performed live with the poet Allen Ginsberg, Ástor Piazzolla, the Modern Jazz Quartet, Tom Waits, David Bowie, and Björk, and has appeared on recordings with Nelly Furtado, Rokia Traore, Joan Armatrading, Brazilian electronica artist Amon Tobin, Texas yodeler Don Walser, Faith No More, Tiger Lillies and David Grisman.

On the 1998 Dave Matthews Band album Before These Crowded Streets, Kronos Quartet performed on the tracks Halloween and The Stone. They also appeared on the 2007 Nine Inch Nails remix album, Year Zero Remixed doing a rendition of the track Another Version of the Truth. They also performed Lee Brooks' score for the short film 2081, based on the Kurt Vonnegut short story "Harrison Bergeron."

In 2009, the quartet contributed an acoustic version of Blind Willie Johnson's "Dark Was the Night" for the AIDS benefit album Dark Was the Night produced by the Red Hot Organization.

By the time the quartet celebrated their twenty-fifth anniversary, in 1999, they had a repertoire of over 600 works, which included 400 string quartets written for them, more than 3,000 performances, seven first-prize ASCAP awards, Edison Awards in classical and popular music, and had sold more than 1.5 million records.


----------



## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

I knew they had arrived in pop culture when they were referenced in a Mystery Science Theatre video. Not too many string quartets end up mentioned there.

Personally, I really like their recordings of Anton Webern - well, all two of them. They play with a fluidity and freedom which I feel the music requires.


----------



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Manxfeeder said:


> I knew they had arrived in pop culture when they were referenced in a Mystery Science Theatre video. Not too many string quartets end up mentioned there.
> 
> Personally, I really like their recordings of Anton Webern - well, all two of them. They play with a fluidity and freedom which I feel the music requires.


They seem to be immune from the abuse one would expect to be heaped upon such cross-genre freakazoids. I wonder why that is?


----------



## ahammel (Oct 10, 2012)

Manxfeeder said:


> I knew they had arrived in pop culture when they were referenced in a Mystery Science Theatre video. Not too many string quartets end up mentioned there.


I've heard jokes about Sergei Prokofiev and Béla Bartók in MST3K and derivatives. They are pretty cultured dudes.

So Kronos have sold a lot of records. Are string quartets required to take a vow of poverty?


----------



## ptr (Jan 22, 2013)

I like then a lot! Along with the Arditti Quartet the Kronos has been the essential driving force behind the expansion of the String Quartet repertoire during the last 30 years!

/ptr


----------



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

ahammel said:


> I've heard jokes about Sergei Prokofiev and Béla Bartók in MST3K and derivatives. They are pretty cultured dudes.
> 
> So Kronos have sold a lot of records. Are string quartets required to take a vow of poverty?


Well, I assumed that commercial success in CM (like Karl Jenkins' Palladio used in De Beers Diamond commercials) was supposed to be instantly discrediting.


----------



## Huilunsoittaja (Apr 6, 2010)

I have a special place in my heart for Kronos... since they've taken up permanent residence at my university for several years! (hint hint, that's how you may discover where I study ). At least once a semester, they do some sort of concert here, usually joint performances with someone else, for ex. guest artist dancers, singers or something like that. I've not seen them. They also do reading of new compositions made by the DMA composers at my university, I've not seen one of those performances yet. Always something else conflicting.  And who knows how much longer it's going to last, maybe not much longer before they move on...


----------



## Manxfeeder (Oct 19, 2010)

ahammel said:


> I've heard jokes about Sergei Prokofiev and Béla Bartók in MST3K and derivatives. They are pretty cultured dudes.


They are; and they know which cultural references to throw out. The Guarnari Quartet wouldn't have made the cut, but referencing the Kronos would cause a knowing nod from a half-drunk college sophomore.

Having said that, they do throw out things that they know most people won't get. Once they likened an actor to Estes Kefauver, which I thought was remarkable. (He's kind of big in Tennessee but I don't know how far beyond.)


----------



## Kleinzeit (May 15, 2013)

Manxfeeder said:


> They are; and they know which cultural references to throw out. The Guarnari Quartet wouldn't have made the cut, but referencing the Kronos would cause a knowing nod from a half-drunk college sophomore.
> 
> Having said that, they do throw out things that they know most people won't get. Once they likened an actor to Estes Kefauver, which I thought was remarkable. (He's kind of big in Tennessee but I don't know how far beyond.)


lol. Mad Magazine used to make fun of him.

"When Max Gaines died in 1947 in a freak boating accident, E.C. Publications became the sole responsibility of twenty-five-year-old Bill Gaines. EC was not doing particularly well at the time. Inheriting such titles as Picture Stories From The Bible and Fat & Slat, Bill saw the writing on he wall & along with Feldstein, embarked on a trail of crime & terror that eventually landed him in the hotseat in front of McCarthie's anti-communist Senator, Estes Kefauver, smack in the middle of the witch hunt hearings on juvenile delinquency."


----------



## Weston (Jul 11, 2008)

Any classical music fan would recognize them as crossing over to the dark side of pop culture when they started naming their albums as if they were rock albums or something. Everyone knows a classical album is supposed to be called something like: _Grand-Suite von anspruchsvollen Konzert Geräusche für Blechbläser und Schlagzeug Kammerorchester und gequält Nilpferd von Georg Philipp van Braunschweiger (komplett)_. Or something like that.

_Black Angels_ is clearly a heavy metal album.


----------



## Avey (Mar 5, 2013)

I am a big fan.

If you have not listened to Steve Reich with the Kronos doing _Different Trains Parts I-III_, you need to.


----------



## Bone (Jan 19, 2013)

The Pat Metheny performance on "Different Trains" is pretty spectacular, too ("electric counterpoint?"). Love Kronos and what they do for chamber music in the modern era.


----------



## Guest (Jun 1, 2013)

Kronos Quartet did a version of a Sigur Ros work Flugufrelsarinn. I'm sorry I listened to it and wouldn't recommend it. I would recommend the Sigur Ros version.


----------



## Guest (Jun 1, 2013)

I prefer their earlier work before they got into world and crossover material. I saw them do a killer "Black Angels" by George Crumb in the early 80s.


----------



## millionrainbows (Jun 23, 2012)

Their Bartok is killer, too, on one of their very early CDs. Their affiliation with Terry Riley has been important as well. "Cadenza on the Night Plain" is great.


----------



## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

Kronos Quartet... legends for me.

Steve Reich's Different Trains on CD is one of my all time prized albums.


----------



## brotagonist (Jul 11, 2013)

I have no albums by the Kronos Quartet, but I have always found them to be quite appealing. There certainly is an element of commercialism in the way they are marketed, which is more like pop music than classical (not being on a classical label is likely why), but their choice of repertoire is definitely appealing to me, as a classical music fan.

The one album I'd really like to have is the complete String Quartets of Alfred Schnittke, but it is currently out of print and only available at horrendous collector prices, if at all.


----------



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Kronos Quartet is one of my guiltiest and most pleasurable guilty pleasures. I'd usually be too embarrassed to post an album of theirs on the current listening thread, but I'm pretty sure I listen to at least one a month. 

Among my favorites: 

- The Black Angels disk is desert island for me. I've written enough about it. 

- Piazzolla's Five Tango Sensations. 

- Golijov's The Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind. The people who don't want to like Kronos Quartet told me to listen to the recording by the St. Lawrence Quartet, and those people were wrong. 

- The album titled "Kronos Quartet" that had Sculthorpe, Sallinen, Glass, Nancarrow, and Hendrix. It's nice to remember that there was a time a couple decades ago when Glass was put in that kind of company. According to "Sid James" who knows a thousand times more about this than I ever will, this album really helped Sculthorpe become better known outside of Australia. 

- The Philip Glass album. If I admitted this in person I'm sure I'd be unable to make eye contact for several minutes. This was my first Philip Glass album. I had no idea I was listening to something so morally compromising! And I thought I was cool for listening to modern music! Poor innocent little high school me. 

- Ostertag's All the Rage. One of the most powerful works for tape that I've ever heard.

- Feldman's Piano and String Quartet. 

- Reich's WTC 9/11. So Adams' work on this subject won the prize, but I find Reich's much more moving. 

- Vask's String Quartet #4. 

You might think I've just listed all the KQ disks I own. Not even close.

I think I need a vacation from tc now to get over my embarrassment.


----------



## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

science said:


> Kronos Quartet is one of my guiltiest and most pleasurable guilty pleasures. I'd usually be too embarrassed to post an album of theirs on the current listening thread, but I'm pretty sure I listen to at least one a month.
> 
> Among my favorites:
> 
> ...


Do you own their ultimate box set--- 10 Years of Kronos Quartet?


----------



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Albert7 said:


> Do you own their ultimate box set--- 10 Years of Kronos Quartet?


I only know about the 25 year box. I own most of that already, so I'm not going to buy the box.


----------



## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

science said:


> I only know about the 25 year box. I own most of that already, so I'm not going to buy the box.


Ooops I meant the 25 year box . Sorry about that. My memory is bad.


----------



## SimonNZ (Jul 12, 2012)

science said:


> Kronos Quartet is one of my guiltiest and most pleasurable guilty pleasures. *I'd usually be too embarrassed to post an album of theirs on the current listening thread,* but I'm pretty sure I listen to at least one a month.


You're kidding, I take it?


----------



## KenOC (Mar 7, 2011)

Albert7 said:


> Do you own their ultimate box set--- 10 Years of Kronos Quartet?


There is a set of 10 CDs titled "Kronos Quartet 25 years." Is that the one you mean? I have that set, but it's OOP right now and cruelly costly.


----------



## Albert7 (Nov 16, 2014)

KenOC said:


> There is a set of 10 CDs titled "Kronos Quartet 25 years." Is that the one you mean? I have that set, but it's OOP right now and cruelly costly.


Yes that box set I meant... is it really OOP? That would suck


----------



## tortkis (Jul 13, 2013)

millionrainbows said:


> Their affiliation with Terry Riley has been important as well. "Cadenza on the Night Plain" is great.


To me, even just their collaboration with Riley is worthy of high praise. Cadenza On The Night Plain is my favorite. I wonder how many of Riley's string quartets can be listened to now without the close relationship between Riley and Kronos Quartet. (Still there are many works not recorded yet. Riley composed more than 27 works for the genre.)


----------



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

SimonNZ said:


> You're kidding, I take it?


Well, I've overcome that embarrassment occasionally....


----------



## Nereffid (Feb 6, 2013)

science said:


> - The Philip Glass album. If I admitted this in person I'm sure I'd be unable to make eye contact for several minutes. This was my first Philip Glass album. I had no idea I was listening to something so morally compromising! And I thought I was cool for listening to modern music! Poor innocent little high school me.


If it helps, Glass's 3rd quartet (Mishima) has been immortalised at #60 in the TC String Quartets list, the 4th is at #80, and the 5th is at #150. I guess there's a bunch of us who are morally compromised and unashamed!


----------



## science (Oct 14, 2010)

Nereffid said:


> If it helps, Glass's 3rd quartet (Mishima) has been immortalised at #60 in the TC String Quartets list, the 4th is at #80, and the 5th is at #150. I guess there's a bunch of us who are morally compromised and unashamed!


Braver souls than I, all.


----------

