The colours of the string quartet – Elena Kats-Chernin talks about ‘Blue Silence’

The colours of the string quartet – Elena Kats-Chernin talks about ‘Blue Silence’

Elena Kats-Chernin says she has been told she can write no more works for String Quartet. She displays a mischievous pleasure at my alarm. The Sydney composer has recently released a recorded collection of her ‘complete’ works for string quartet, entitled Blue Silence. ‘Complete’ to date, and therefore the end of a chapter. “But it’s only the…

A quartet of six

A quartet of six

It’s a dream combination. A composer in the mainstream of her creativity handpicks a string quartet to make the premiere recording of her music and then coaches them in the way she wants to the music to sound. Add to this, a recording producer who understands implicitly what the composer wants and who has the formidable reputation as…

‘Fast Blue Village’: Kats-Chernin has the last laugh

‘Fast Blue Village’: Kats-Chernin has the last laugh

Fast Blue Village has the perfect formula – an immensely popular living composer, an ensemble selected by her to record her music and a recording producer with a sharply honed instinct for how the composer wants her music to sound. The composer is Elena Kats-Chernin who heard the Acacia Ensemble play some of her music early in 2011. She decided they had the sound she…