Tickets: $20 ($5 student) suggested donation at the door (no reservations necessary for the concert)

PLUS: OPTIONAL Prix fixe dinner at The Rabbit Room starting at 6:00 pm (see menu below!)
     $28 per person - RESERVATIONS for DINNER are Required
    Call The Rabbit Room directly at (585) 582-1830 by FEBRUARY 5 to reserve your dinner with a credit card

About the Music (notes by David Brickman)

    May, 1824 saw the last public concerts of Beethoven's music given during his lifetime. No longer able to perform as a pianist or a conductor because of his deafness, Beethoven turned his attention exclusively to composing. The string quartet genre occupied him for the last few years of his life. The first of his so-called "Late Quartets" was the String Quartet in E-flat Major, Opus 127, a work which, despite its massive proportions, adheres to the classical model of having four movements.

    The first movement, Maestoso - Allegro, begins with a brief and powerful declamation in 2/4 time, a musical pillar which recurs twice more to punctuate and support the grand structure of this essentially lyrical movement in 3/4 time.

    The Adagio molto espressivo in A-flat major is a set of variations on an inward-looking theme of profound calm. The first variation is effusive and sighing, while the second is a capricious game of one-upmanship between the two violins. The center of the movement finds the theme transformed beyond easy recognition to the remote key of E major where Beethoven expresses a deep, longing spirituality. He finds his way back to A-flat and the movement closes with utmost simplicity.

    The third movement, Scherzando vivace, departs from the preceding tone of lyricism with its jagged rhythms and mercurial changes in temperament. A contrasting passage in the uncomfortable key of E-flat minor hurtles along at great velocity, requiring great skill from the first violinist. The Scherzando returns, followed by an abruptly-silenced fragment of the hurtling music. The Scherzando starts up again, but Beethoven has had enough and the movement is over within seconds.

    The finale, Allegro in cut time, returns to the home key of E-flat and to the genial mood which pervades this quartet. Beethoven offers his characteristic sudden contrasts in dynamics but never leaves good humor behind, even in the whirling and insistent fortissimo passages. Perhaps the movement's most striking feature is its coda in the unlikely key of C major and the unexpected time signature of 6/8. The passage begins pianissimo (very quietly) with cascades of rapid, slurred notes creating a sound "color" which foreshadows Impressionism, still decades in the future. The music evolves towards its logical and powerful conclusion, but Beethoven teases and toys with us along the way.