The Ying Quartet, siblings from Illinois who formed an ensemble while studying at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, here offer a new installment in the LifeMusic series, featuring works newly commissioned from a variety of American composers. The group is effective in a variety of idioms, and the LifeMusic releases have been of consistently high quality and have introduced some composers whose names are not in general circulation. The works favored by individual listeners may be primarily a matter of taste, but ...
Read More
The Ying Quartet, siblings from Illinois who formed an ensemble while studying at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY, here offer a new installment in the LifeMusic series, featuring works newly commissioned from a variety of American composers. The group is effective in a variety of idioms, and the LifeMusic releases have been of consistently high quality and have introduced some composers whose names are not in general circulation. The works favored by individual listeners may be primarily a matter of taste, but one may state at least that one work here is a standout in terms of advancing a particular technique rather than simply attempting to perfect it: Sebastian Currier's Next Atlantis, a meditation on New Orleans, Hurricane Katrina, and rising waters generally, breaks new ground in creating an accessible fusion of conventional instrument with prerecorded electronics. The string quartet seems to embody a human layer above the water sounds provided by the electronics, but the two layers...
Read Less
