Euclid Quartet: Transcript
Episode link for Podcast, Video and Shownotes
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Pick something else. And I was like, I don't know. My sister took me to recitals, she took me to a tuba recital, and I was like, no, bassoon recita,l flute. And I was just not interested. I was more into sports at the time. I was just like, this isn't going to work. I just like playing soccer. This is my thing. I mean, we have my sister...
Jameson Cooper:
Well, I think that's probably changed a little bit over the years. I think we're now more a group that will try to speak less at first and not try to work out the minutia of things from the get go, but try to get more of a feel for the piece or bigger picture.
Justin Goldsmith:
So in terms of performance, yeah, I do think it's important to find different venues, different audiences, different repertoire, just all different stuff to just keep things fresh and also to stretch yourself.
Aviva Hakanoglu:
Nerves are constantly a part of things, but I've found that we are performing a lot in all sorts of different circumstances, and just the practice of performing is so helpful. The seventh time you play the same piece, the nerves definitely go down. Breathing, jumping around, dancing and playing the same things a bunch of times. Keys to success!
Leah Roseman:
Hi, you're listening to Conversations with Musicians with Leah Roseman, and today's episode is unusual because four musicians are featured, the members of the Euclid Quartet. They are a world-class string quartet, celebrating their 25th anniversary with a fantastic album of short pieces entitled Breve, and we are featuring several pieces from that album as part of this episode. The link that will take you to all the places to listen to and buy this album is right in the description of this episode along with their website. In this conversation, you'll get to know each member of the quartet, which is in residence at the Indiana University South Bend. Jameson Coope,r violinist and founding member originally from England; you'll hear about his experience as a student of Dorothy De Delay and Roland and Alvita Vamos. He also talked about the formative years of the quartet and the nuts and bolts of learning repertoire.
The other violinist in the quartet is Aviva Hakanoglu, who holds degrees from Harvard, Indiana University and Stony Brook University and was a student of Philip Setzer. And it was really interesting to hear about her experience auditioning for the quartet and her perspectives on community outreach and as an educator. Violist Luis Enrique Vargas is a longtime member of the Euclid Quartet and started his life in music in Venezuela at the age of 14, and spoke about introducing Latin American composers to his colleagues. Finally, cellist Justin Goldsmith is the newest member of the quartet. When he was completing his Master's degree at Indiana University, he formed the Vera Quartet, which held residencies at both IU and the Curtis Institute of Music, where he was also a Community Artist Fellow. I was curious to learn more about the many roles the quartet plays in their capacities as performers, educators, and collaborators, and to hear them speak about the special joys and challenges of being members of a full-time quartet.
Like all my episodes, you can watch this on my YouTube channel or listen to the podcast on all the platforms. And I've also linked the transcript to my website, leahroseman.com. Finally, before we jump into the episode, I wanted to remind you that this is Season Four and there are well over a hundred episodes you may have missed with a fascinating variety of musicians, and that I'm an independent podcaster who needs the help of my listeners to keep this project going. And the link to buy me a cup of coffee is in the description. Now, to the episode.
Hi, good morning, Euclid Quartet. Thanks so much for joining me here today.
Jameson Cooper:
Hi.
Leah Roseman:
So you are the first string quartet I featured on this series, and I'm so glad you could all join me. I think it's very cool. I mean, the string quartet is such an important ensemble and form of music, but not all my listeners will be familiar. Not everyone knows classical music, and I was thinking when I went to university, I had not experienced string quartets to that point and wasn't familiar with the repertoire. And I remember there was a jazz saxophone player who said, "you don't know the late string quartets of Beethoven? Just go immediately to the library and listened to those", and it was so mind blowing to get exposed to that music. Jameson, you grew up in the UK, I get the impression there's a little more of a culture of chamber music for youth. Is that right?
Jameson Cooper:
Gosh, I wouldn't say so. I mean, I really didn't have an awful lot of chamber music experience myself, and until I got to college, well I sort of threw together the second movement of the Barber string quartet once with some buddies. And we used to, I was in the National Youth Orchestra in England, and we would always try to have a get together and smash through some things, and it was usually Mendelssohn Octet we tried to put together. But I wouldn't really say I had a tremendous amount of chamber music until I got to college. I didn't really have an awful lot there either, but it was part of the course, and I certainly got my feet wet a little bit with quartets and trios and things there. But I think there's more infrastructure here in the United States to support that activity actually than there is in England, certainly nowadays. I mean, it's very difficult in England now for classical music. The business itself is dwindling, I think, more rapidly than it is here. So anyway, that said, I certainly listened to the music and I was interested in it, although I wasn't expecting that that would eat up my life, but that's the way it goes, yeah.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah. We're going to talk a lot about education and outreach, which is so important, but let's get into your beautiful album. You're just releasing Breve, and I love these kind of albums with short pieces, and certainly when I was putting together chamber music concerts, I'd always look for a short piece we could kind of add in there to balance things out. So I'm sure you have used these pieces not only as encores, I'm guessing you've also inserted them into programs. Did you guys have a lot of discussion around deciding what to put on this album?
Jameson Cooper:
I wouldn't say a great deal. These pieces have been in and out of our repertoire over the years, so they were sort of naturally selected. We didn't really pick anything new specifically for the album. I don't think they were all things that had been around before. I think probably the Mozart Adagio and Fugue was the most recent thing that we picked up. But again, it wasn't just for the album, we had played it before. But as you, we've sort of had them functioning sometimes as encores, but very often it was to try to just sort of change out the pace a little bit of a program, especially if you're doing things like late Beethoven or Bartox Six or something like that, and people just, you'd say, okay, let's just have something a little fun now and again, so we're not too full of ourselves the whole time. So I think they've functioned in a couple of different capacities for us over the years, but they're all just pieces that are dear to our hearts so that we want to give them the same love that we have some of the larger works that we have in albums.
Leah Roseman:
I love to feature music early in an episode so people can hear what you're about. Now, there were a few pieces on here I was not familiar with. Javier Alvarez wrote this Metro Chabacano. Luis, you were telling me earlier you had introduced the quartet to this piece.
Luis Enrique Vargas:
So I had a string quartet before I joined the Euclid Quartet. So it goes back to the time I was in Venezuela, and we applied to several music festivals in the United States and also in Mexico. And we actually ended up coming to the US to the Round Top festival. I'm not going to say the year, that was many years ago, but then we went to San Miguel de Allende and also Morelia that year. So we were introduced of, this piece was introduced to us by the Cuarteto Americano, and we got very excited about it, and then they suggested we learn it. So we actually worked with them with a couple of the members of the quartet, and we really liked it. So it's a piece that it was originally composed to accompany, a kinetic installation at a subway station. That's what metro means. Metro, and there's actually a subway station metro Chabacano. I had to go to that one when I was in Mexico City. I actually went to that station just to look at it. But you hear it in the music, it's very much well like that. It's kinetic. There's so much motion going on and it's a little unrelenting, but very, very interesting, very short piece that it's, there's a lot of motion in it. So I introduced that piece to my colleagues as well as a couple other Latin American pieces that we wanted to consider in our rep.
Leah Roseman:
You're about to hear Metro Chabacano by Javier Alvarez, who is one of Mexico's most important composers. He died in 2023 at the age of 67. All the tracks featured in this podcast are from the Euclid Quartet's album, and you will find all the buying and streaming links at the link in the description. (music) Wonderful, thanks.
I wanted to ask about this American Masterpieces grant that you guys received way back in 2009. So I'm guessing Jameson and Luis, you were in the quartet at that time?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Yeah.
Jameson Cooper:
Yes.
Leah Roseman:
It seems to me you guys were a little bit on the leading edge of awareness of representation and diversity in the music you're presenting and outreach with schools.
Jameson Cooper:
Well, it was something we were sort of doing without any particular sociological intent behind it. We had pieces that we happened to be playing that we had a friend who was Puerto Rican and we enjoyed playing his music, and we had this piece by Jennifer Higdon, and so we had quite a cross section of American composers that we had played, and that happened to come from various backgrounds and different parts of society and stuff. So we realized when we were looking into making these school programs that, Hey, we have something here where this is all American music, but it sort of shows the broad spectrum of what it means to be an American. So we had Asian-American and Latino, and African-American, and we just had a nice sort of cross section of music, and I think we only actually needed to find a couple of other pieces to put in that program to feel like we'd represented as many different facets as we could think of.
So it sort of naturally suggested itself when we were thinking about this idea of the educational program that would not only introduce people to great music, but also have kids thinking a little bit more about identity and how that's represented in music. So it was definitely a fun project. We built a robot, well, a fake robot. It looked like a robot that spoke to the kids, and they were quizzed on different things, and it was just a really, really fun and different endeavor for us at the time. And it just turned out that, yeah, a few years later, people were definitely thinking more along these lines in terms of programming for adults and incorporating this music more regularly into concert programs than perhaps had been before.
Leah Roseman:
It was interesting when I was looking at what you guys do, thinking about what the career of a string quartet can look like, because I think that it was never, even when there were maybe more chamber music series and programs, I'm not sure how things have really changed, but I'm guessing there were never that many string quartets that could really make a living by performing and recording. So you guys do so many things, and a lot of it does involve education. Justin, could you speak to that a little bit? I know you had background when you were at Curtis, you were that you did this outreach as part of that.
Justin Goldsmith:
Sure. Yeah. I think the sort of well-trod path for a long time for quartets was to just tour and record, and that was kind of it. There was musicians always teach, but there were, and are still very few faculty residencies for full string quartets. So I think we're pretty lucky to be filling one of those positions at IUSB, and I think quartets in 2024 have to do a lot of different things in order to make it work. I think there are still those very, very few groups who are able to make their entire career out of touring and recording, but even those groups, I think have teaching responsibilities and do a lot of other things. So I think it's a good thing for quartets to be versatile. I think it's a good thing that the industry has forced quartets to be versatile, and I think it's just really important to, as an individual and as a group, be able to adapt to any kind of situation that you find yourself in, whether it's teaching, performing in some unconventional space, doing specifically outreach work, all of that kind of stuff. There's just so much that goes into what you do as a quartet that you have to be very ready for anything.
Leah Roseman:
I've noticed, I'm in my mid fifties and certainly when I was in school, no one talked about outreach or playing in unconventional settings, and I've noticed a lot of institutions now are encouraging students. They have specific programs. So Justin, you were involved with this thing at Curtis, right? This fellowship. Do you want to speak to that experience, maybe a memorable experience through that?
Justin Goldsmith:
Sure. I think one of the most memorable things that I did during those two years was this huge citywide project in Philly called Rehearsing Philadelphia. It was sort of the brainchild of Ari Benjamin Myers composer and sound artist, and the scope of the project was actually enormous. I was involved in a couple of the modules as they were called, and what we did was go to a gallery in town and set up ensembles that played durational performances. So it was like four hours of music happening in the space, and people could just walk through and there were some people playing Bach in a corner of the gallery. Then there were some people playing piano, violin duet somewhere else in the gallery. And then at certain points, we would all come together and do something like clapping music by Steve Reich. It was kind of a planned but unplanned musical journey for whoever wanted to walk through the space, and I really enjoyed that. I think that sort of programming is still unfamiliar for me, but really, really interesting to do.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I've heard of certainly a few things like that happening here in my city. We always need to find new audiences, I think. And there's so many people who will love this music, but they just don't know it yet.
Well, I really love Wolf's Italian Serenade, and maybe we'll just play a clip of it. It's a little long, but I love this piece. I've played it. So Aviva, was that a piece you'd played before you joined the Quartet?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
Nope. I had never played that one before. Definitely a challenge. It's really technically demanding for everyone. Obviously the first violin is probably the most in the stratosphere, but the second violin definitely gets its licks. So yeah, that was definitely a tricky one for me to just jump in and getting the fingers and get comfortable with. That's one of the things that recording really brings to light. It's never comfortable to live perform, but recording just really, it's a mental journey, and if you're not already comfortable, really comfortable with the music you're recording, it can be quite the experience.
Leah Roseman:
This is an excerpt from Hugo Wolf's Italian Serenade. (music)
I am curious, in terms of your rehearsal process, do you guys record yourselves often to hear back, or is that just crazy making?
Jameson Cooper:
We should do it more than we do. We used to
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Do more of that actually.
Jameson Cooper:
Yeah, I think it can be brutal, but it is just a very fast track toward one that we should use more.
Leah Roseman:
So Justin, if I could ask, I'm curious because with the use of iPads now, do you guys ever read off the score just to make it easier to figure it out?
Justin Goldsmith:
Yeah, definitely both on the iPad and off. The quartet, over the years, I've actually been in the group for even less time than Aviva, but the quartet over the years has put together a pretty large library of physical parts and scores. So we have those at our disposal. We can still go and reference them. And yes, we do all actually have tablets now, which is great. And using the tablets and physical parts, it's all helpful for the rehearsal process.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I was just thinking because in the old days before we had that to read off a score, there's just so many page turns, but if you're using a foot pedal, it makes it more practical in terms of figuring it out, just seeing it.
Justin Goldsmith:
Absolutely. I think Aviva, I think sometimes you read off of a score. I think you may be the only one of us that does that.
Leah Roseman:
So Jameson, you were part of the quartet since the beginning.
Jameson Cooper:
Yes.
Leah Roseman:
And I was curious if you wanted to talk to some of those early days, like you guys had a residency at Aspen or any of those formative experiences, how they impacted the quartet?
Jameson Cooper:
Sure. The quartet began as a graduate string quartet at Kent State University in Ohio, and we were there from 1998 through 2001 is when it actually became the Euclid Quartet. And during that time at the school there, we entered a couple of competitions and we were successful. We got a couple prizes, and that sort of encouraged us to continue with that professionally. We were very excited about it. So we got our first job in Sioux City, Iowa as a resident quartet of the symphony there, and there was a large educational component to our work there. We did a lot of cutting our teeth in that arena and going out to elementary schools and middle schools and crafting different programs tailored to each different age range and each level of experience with the instruments. So we spent a lot of time with that, and at the same time, we were rehearsing like crazy in this little church that generously donated their space to us.
And we fought our way through Bartók Four and Brahms A minor and things like that. And we were very aware that while we were lucky to have a job and that was great, we were getting paid to do what we wanted to do, we still felt like we had a lot to learn and we wanted to have more performance experience outside of where we were living. So we applied for the Aspen Music Festival Center for Quartet, Advanced Quartet Studies, and I think that was 2002 that we probably did the - I think it was January, 2002, freezing cold day in Chicago. We went to Roosevelt University. It was just blistering cold and we played for Earl Carlyss from the Juilliard Quartet there, and we'd never met him before. But anyway, we were fortunate to get a spot to go study there that summer, and that was just an amazing experience. It was us with two other quartets, great groups, and very inspiring to not only see them and have masterclasses with them, but to also see these other guest artists coming in to perform and learn from them. So that was definitely a hugely formative experience for us as the quartet and a completely different world from what was happening the year round for us in our daily activities there, because we were literally just focusing on repertoire and building our chops, so we weren't doing anything else. So it was a very focused time and it was a very special time in a very beautiful place. So it was great. So we did that for two summers with 2003 and four, I think. Oh, two and three, was it? 2002 and three. And then I think the other big educational thing for us around that time was the Carnegie Hall professional training workshops that we did; a week with two other quartets of intensive work on the even numbered Bartók string quartets, culminating in performance there at Weill Hall, and the Emerson Quartet was with the coaches for that. And so we saw them every day and the hours and hours of time together with them. So again, very intensive time, but just extremely inspiring and ultimately that led to us was recording all of the Bartók string quartets. So definitely an important part of our journey there too.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I was just thinking both violinists in the Emerson studied with Oscar Shumsky, I believe, as did I think Roland Vamos that you studied with. Yeah, just legacy. It's always interesting to me, the lineage. So actually you studied with some very famous teachers. Do you want to speak to any of that early education experience?
Jameson Cooper:
Sure. Well, after I finished in England, I came over to the United States to study with Dorothy DeLay. Before the quartet, I went to Aspen on my own. So I studied with Dorothy De Delay and Masao Kawasaki. They sort of tag teamed. And that was a dream for me because I had grown up listening to Itzhak Perlman. I just loved his playing and idolized him. So I thought, well, I see if I can get to see his teacher, then maybe I'll start to sound like one 10th of Itzhak Perlman. So that was very exciting to me to study with them. And after a while, I then moved to Ohio and I was in Oberlin for a while, so that's where I met the Vemoses, Mr. And Mrs. Vemos there. And that's what ultimately led me to Kansas State University. It's a long story, which I don't think your listeners probably want to know, but it was from Oberlin to Kansas State, and then boom, a Euclid quartet happened.
Leah Roseman:
The Vamoses are famous, they're a couple that kind of tag team taught. How did that work? Did they alternate? Was there a system?
Jameson Cooper:
I alternated weeks with them and I would do primarily technical work with Mr. Vamos. So I went through all the Sevčiks, all the Paganini caprices, just a lot of notes with him and a lot of drier things too. But the Paganinis were definitely fun. We were able to have a little bit of musical fun with that. Mrs. Vamos is a very emotive teacher, I would say. And so I will always remember when she would demo, she couldn't help herself, but she'd sing along at the same time as well. She's just, so much coming out all the time. So I did primarily repertoire with her and a bunch of pieces. For some reason, Prokofiev 1 is jumping to mind and Bach Chaconne as well, I remember working on that with her too, but they were really complimented. They didn't sort of get in each other's way at all, and I think it worked nicely that I didn't take the same stuff to each one of them. I was doing these two things concurrently.
Leah Roseman:
It is interesting you mentioned Masao Kawasaki because his son Yosuke is our concert master who is also featured on this podcast.
Jameson Cooper:
He scared me, not his son. Masao, I remember him telling me, once your violin playing sounds like you have a cold. I'm like, he was definitely a little drier than Mrs. Vamos, let's put it that way. But great. I mean straight to the point and always knew exactly what needed to be done to get it sounding better.
Leah Roseman:
And did you have that experience with Dorothy DeLay that you'd have to wait in the hallway for your lesson?
Jameson Cooper:
Oh yeah. Yeah. I remember sitting in Julliard for hours there, and then one day it was terrible. Sarah Chang was right before me. I thought, come on, really? I got to follow Sarah Chang. That's not fair. So I think I even said something to that effect when I came into the room. I said, okay, come on. I know who you've just been speaking to and working with. Sorry, I'll do my best. I ain't Sarah Chang.
Leah Roseman:
So another piece I was hoping to feature on this episode is the Shostakovich Polka. You guys play it so well. It's such a cool piece. Would any of you like to speak to that?
Justin Goldsmith:
Yeah, the Shostakovich Polka is one of the goofiest things that we've ever done. It's a very funny piece to begin with, just looking at the notation even. It's just very strange, and it's got that sort of Shostakovich sardonic sensibility, but then it also has just pure slapstick in it, which is very fun. And we found some things that perhaps are not in the score. We had this idea to make the violins sound like they started playing a month ago at a certain point, and had a lot of fun with that. That one was a real blast to put together, especially because it comes together pretty quick, but it's a fairly simple piece to put together, and then there's so much that you can do with it to make it even sillier than it is to begin with.
Leah Roseman:
Interesting. It doesn't sound easy to put together. I mean, you guys, there's so much life to it, to your performance.
Jameson Cooper:
I think if you were to play it with a metronome and just learn the notes, I don't think it would be, certainly compared to the Wolf Italian Serenade, it's a lot less to deal with. But I think we did a lot of jarring tempo changes and things that are not written in there just to try to amp up the character changes. So I know the bit that Justin was talking about with the violins, we're written in minor seconds, so it already sounds bad intentionally. But then we played with no bow, and then we had this idea that it would be the story of this miraculous student that within eight bars suddenly learn how to do staccato. And so if you listen carefully, you hear that it exponentially gets better, it starts sounding awful, and then we learn as we go. So we had fun with that silly story and the piece there, but yeah.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I could hear that for sure. This polka is from Dmitri Shastakovich's score to the ballet, The Golden Age.(music)
Aviva, if you could talk to the experience of joining an established string quartet and what that audition process was like.
Aviva Hakanoglu:
Sure. Yeah. So I joined the quartet. This is my third year, and I don't know, maybe unlike Jamie, quartet was kind of what I wanted for basically as long as I can really remember wanting music to be a part of my life, I did a lot of it growing up as well. And so I've always kind of been on the hunt for the job I have now. So to primarily be doing string quartet and integrating, especially university teaching, that's been great. So when the job posting opened up, well talk about lineage. I shared the mentor of the Emerson Quartet when I did my doctorate. I was at Stony Brook, so I was working with Phil Setzer and the whole Emerson Quartet very regularly. I was in a quartet there. I continued in a different string quartet out in Pittsburgh before joining this group. So I was really kind of gunning for that. So Phil Setzer encouraged me and maybe just gave my name. And so I applied to audition and it's interesting, especially because the university is kind of overseeing the search. It's not just like quartet picks and you're good to go. The audition process involved quartet, just jumping in and rehearsing together, they told me a couple pieces to prepare both first and second violin parts. Then I also did some teaching demonstration stuff, some interview stuff. So I think it's really the whole package. As Justin said earlier, versatility is really important. So one of the things that I think is especially really important for a university like Indiana University South Bend is the community aspect. It is designed as a commuter school for this area. So as part of our job, we are very much integrated in the community and in this area. So that was something that I kind of think brought to the table in my interview, as well as something that I had done a lot of previously, both as an ensemble member, but just as a person. So that was something that I introduced. But yeah, it's always really fun when you play with a certain set of people for an extended period of time. You really start to learn their mannerisms. You kind of can integrate. And so as soon as it's a different set of three people who've learned each other's mannerisms, it's a fun little on-the-go puzzle and different personalities. So yeah, I mean, I had a great time at the audition, however nerve-wracking it was. But yeah, it's an interesting beast, I must say.
Leah Roseman:
What are your most effective tools, Aviva, for dealing with nerves?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
Oh gosh. Well, you will often find me jumping around backstage. Meditation has been a really important part of my life for the past few years. That's something that I kind of do very regularly. So incorporating breath work and breathing beforehand. I get really cold all the time, so before performances is really tough for me. But yeah, trying to find ways to stay warm. The jumping up and down is part of that. If there's a little more space, maybe like doing a little dance. Yeah. But yeah, nerves are constantly a part of things, but I've found that we are performing a lot in all sorts of different circumstances, and just the practice of performing is so helpful. The seventh time you play the same piece, the nerves definitely go down. Yeah, and I think the more comfortable I get in different spaces and with different repertoire, that helps. So breathing, jumping around, dancing and playing the same things a bunch of times, keys to success.
Leah Roseman:
I was thinking about how as an orchestral musician, when we do auditions, it's all completely screened now. And of course there's no interview. We don't even look at cvs. I mean, it's just how you play. You have those few minutes to prove yourself. It's so different in the chamber music world.
Jameson Cooper:
It is, yeah. I think there's nothing more brutal than an orchestra audition for, it's just, I can't think of anything else in life in any other field that's quite like it. It's a very impersonal way of presenting something that has been your whole life, very personal. It's a very strange thing. And how much of your personality do you let show or do you just want to get it right or do dare show a little bit of your ideas on the things? So it is a curious thing for sure, and certainly in terms of quartet auditions, it's a very different mindset from that. Because you are interested in not only how well somebody plays, but the personality of that newcomer, how they're going to work with you. Can you see yourself being in the same room hours and hours a day every day? Does it feel like it's going to work? And also, how's that personality going to come across to others as well? Do you have a real live wire that's going to make you seem more sparkly or they seem so, yeah, the personality I think is something that is very much assessed in a chamber music audition and something that is pretty much an unknown in the orchestra audition setting.
Leah Roseman:
Now, Jameson, you also conduct.
Jameson Cooper:
I do, yeah. Not very well, but
Leah Roseman:
How is that different in terms of being more of a boss as opposed to working collaboratively in the quartet?
Jameson Cooper:
Well, I'm the boss in the quartet as well. (laughing from the quartet) No, I mean I conduct primarily students. It's mostly that. So there's a natural hierarchy built into it anyway. But I certainly try to establish a feel in the room where I'm open to suggestion while I will try to focus everything and teach. I certainly don't think I am inflexible with things like that. So I don't actually feel that far removed as a conductor from what I do it in chamber music. Really. I mean, even physically, I think of the way I'll give an upbeat with a baton is very much how I try to do it with a bow or the scroll or whatever. So I cannot say I consciously change other than the fact that students as opposed to colleagues, there's a slightly different way of speaking than there, but it's not fundamentally different to me by any means.
Leah Roseman:
Is there frustration with not being able to make the sound? You know what I mean?
Jameson Cooper:
No, I make plenty of sound the rest of the time. So no, I've never thought that actually, no. I sometimes get frustrated with what I'm hearing and sometimes like give me that violin, more like this. But no, generally I like conducting very much. We just did the local opera company here. We just did a production of the Merry Widow and it, it's really a fun experience for me to, especially that where with the theatrical element as well, it's quite different and just gets different juices going, I guess.
Justin Goldsmith:
And having played the Haydn Concerto, the Haydn C major with the IUSB orchestra last semester can confirm the vibe that Jamie is talking about. He does create that.
Leah Roseman:
Hi, just a short break from the episode, which I hope you're enjoying so far. If you want to check out over a hundred episodes you may have missed in addition to your podcast player or YouTube, I have an extensive website, leahroseman.com with show notes, transcripts, the complete catalog of episodes, and you can sign up there for my weekly newsletter to get access to Sneak Peeks of upcoming guests. Please do share your favorite episodes with your friends, follow me on social media and share my posts. And if you can spare a few dollars to help support the series, that would be amazing. And you can find that link in the show notes. I'm an independent podcaster and I really do need the help of my listeners. Now, back to the episode.
Luis Enrique Vargas:
I have an interesting experience about that idea of conducting without hearing what you're conducting. I actually had to learn conducting as well from our previous job in Sioux City, Iowa. Both Jamie and I had to conduct a youth orchestra, but during Covid for a chamber music project, I had this idea to conduct the Adagietto from Mahler Symphony number five on my own as I was whistling the entire movement. So I videotaped myself conducting in front of the camera, whistling the entire thing, and then I had this idea to put together a group of students and myself, following myself, conducting and turn that conducting into actual music. So I had everybody record themselves watching me conduct, including myself. It was pretty interesting. And then the final product is like, wow, that's what I thought about in the moment when I conducted that one Saturday morning, I woke up at eight in the morning. I just did it for fun. I was like, I would've done it differently. But since I did it, it was just interesting the timing, what came in my mind at that moment and hearing what came in my mind at that morning made music. It was very interesting.
Leah Roseman:
Luis, I'm trying to understand. You were whistling the viola part?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
No, I was whistling the entire parts, like the melodies, I like to whistle myself. So something my colleagues make fun of me about, because I used to, I even consider entering a whistling competition. I was very serious about that. Yeah, years ago I had a tooth broken and then my whistling was actually pretty good until I decided to cover that tooth. And then it was no longer good. I would think about the entire piece, the melodic line, and then I'll whistle the whole thing. That's what I did.
Leah Roseman:
Before we leave this, can you talk to the world of international whistling competitions? I'm kind of curious about this.
Luis Enrique Vargas:
I actually don't know much about it. There was a competition back in, man. I think it was, I mean, when I came to the United States many years ago, and as I say that was back when I could whistle very well, but there is such a thing. If you actually do a search on whistling competition, there are amazing people there that can do amazing things. And one of the weirdest things that I could do that I can't anymore is with that hole in my tooth, I could do articulations, which I can't do anymore. So I picked, I remember Ruslan und Ludmilla for Glinka, and it's very fast, very virtuosic, and I could do continuous breathing just like an oboist could be to do so I could whistle inwards as well as outwards, so continuously, as I was doing the articulation. I mean, I don't know how I was able to do that, but I can't anymore.
Leah Roseman:
That's very cool. There's a video on YouTube Four, for Tango, the Piazza, which is also in the album. Could we use some of that in this episode so people can see you play? Do any of you want to talk about that piece?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
Sure. Yeah. I mean, I would say probably the most fun piece on the album, well, okay, it's a tango I guess. But I think the unique aspect of it is what we get to do with our instruments. I don't think any of the other pieces quite have this. So Piazzolla tries to get some effects that imitate a tango band, but he only has our instruments to work with. So he writes in things like drum or whip. So we have these little effects that kind of achieve tango-band-like things using just our string instruments. So the viola has figured out how to do this drum effect very well. We also have something called sandpaper, so it gets this kind of scratchy, percussive instrument. It's definitely a fun one. There's the tango base, but there's also all of the effects that bring it to beyond the string quartet kind of sound world. So that's a fun one.
Leah Roseman:
Wonderful, thanks. This performance of Astor Piazzolla's Four, for Tango is from a live video of a performance at Indiana University South Bend by the Euclid Quartet. If you're listening to the podcast version of this episode, the original video is linked in the description and their other recording of this is part of their album, Breve.(music)
Now, you guys recorded, I think your first recording was Hugo Kauder's String
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Quartet. Yep. That actually was an interesting situation. So the Hugo Kauder Society put together competitions every year. I don't think they do that anymore. But the first competition they did was the String quartet competition to honor the music of the composer, Hugo Kauder, who was a Jewish composer living in Vienna and beautiful music that he composed. But at the time the Nazis took over Vienna, he was able to escape and immigrated to the United States. So the foundation, so the society was founded in New Haven, Connecticut, the family of the composer, and at the time of the competition, the son of the composer was alive. And then so we entered the competition. So you're supposed to perform a piece of the composer plus something else. So we chose Quartet number two of by Hugo Kauder, and we actually won the first prize. So that competition and the son of the composer talked to me after the competition, and he told me that actually the composer was a violist himself.
And then I noticed immediately it just a connection of the viola part. I mean so beautifully written for the viola, and he had an affinity with my plan. It was very beautiful talking to him. But anyway, he invited me to be a member of the society, the Hugo Kauder Society. And as part of that relationship, a suggestion came out to do a recording, at least, I don't know exactly what they wanted. We decided to do four quartets, the first four quartets of Hugo Kauder. We actually made a proposal to the society, and they actually covered the expenses of that. So we recorded that. This was early years of the quartet, actually. We were still living in Sioux City, Iowa. So yeah, our very first CD.
Leah Roseman:
Luis, did you start on violin, a lot of violas or right away on viola?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Yes and no. I wanted piano, actually. I was interested in being a pianist. My sister was a very committed pianist. We only had a piano in my house, and she played seven hours, eight hours a day. So my mom was like, I don't think you should play piano. She's not going to let you practice, so pick something else. And I was like, I don't know. And my sister took me to recitals, she took me to a tuba recital, and I was like, no, bassoon recital, flute. And I was just not interested. I was more into sports at the time. I was just like, this isn't going to work. I just like playing soccer. This is my thing. I mean, we have my sister to be a musician in the family. Let's keep it like that. But then I started getting interested in music more and more.
And then actually my sister was my inspiration. That's why I started thinking about piano being my instrument. But then eventually she took me to a recital, violin, and I was like, oh, I do like the violin. Alright, so my parents bought me a violin, and at the time, there wasn't a teacher to teach me. So there was a person who traveled from far and was constantly canceling lessons, and I got very frustrated. So eventually my parents asked, well, what could he be working on now? Well, before his first lesson. And he's like, well buy him the Suzuki book, number one. And then I sort of taught myself out of the pictures of the Suzuki book, watching the postures and all that. So for a month or a little over a month, I just self-taught from the Suzuki book. And eventually I went to my first lesson. I was already 14 years old, pretty grownup. And my teacher was like, you know, should consider playing the viola, you're a tall guy, the instrument full-size violin looks pretty small on you. I think you should consider playing the viola. And there you go. I mean, within weeks I was switched to viola. So my extent as a violinist was very short.
Leah Roseman:
Okay. So Justin, you also joined the quartet. You're the most recent member. So what was your experience like switching groups? And
Justin Goldsmith:
So my audition experience was pretty similar to what Aviva described, but my experience, the reason that I applied for the job was - so you all remember 2020? So right as the pandemic hit, two of my colleagues in my old group who were originally from Spain, they decided to move home to be with family and to create lives over there. So my quartet throughout the pandemic, my old group, we basically were half a quartet. And that led me to think about the future and to look for stability and seeing an opening in a quartet that has had a 25 year career. And that is pretty much the definition of stability within this very narrow field. That was something that was very attractive to me. And coming out and playing with these guys was super fun. So it was the right moment and the right opportunity. Yeah,
Leah Roseman:
The Schubert Quartettsatz, it's just so great. And of course, Schubert is such an important composer for quartets. Would that be a good idea to include a little bit of that?
Jameson Cooper:
Yeah. Great.
Leah Roseman:
Jamie, do you want to talk to Schubert and what it means as a quartet player, to have his music?
Jameson Cooper:
Yeah, sure. I mean, I think Schubert's incredibly difficult to play similar to Beethoven. It just doesn't feel great a lot of the time. And I specifically remember that this piece, we learned this early on in the quartet days, and I remember getting very frustrated with the dynamics. Everything is like piano, pianissimo, triple p. It's like, well, can we ever actually play anything? So I guess as you spend more time with things, you sort of make your peace with that and you learn that, well, you've got this range and present it here, there or whatever. But it is more about colors and the feel of things rather than a decibel level. So when we first learned it, I didn't necessarily think quite as well in those terms as I do now, but I think who knows what the rest of the piece was going to be like. But what I love about it is that it really does work beautifully on its own because it's got such a range of moods in it. It starts with a very sort of energetic and somewhat mysterious quality to it with a very fast build to a very dramatic Neapolitan moment. And then quickly, then we get into this very singing song-like Schubert melodies that we all know and love. It just weaves in and out of that. And the accomplimental textures are so busy in this piece as well. I think that's a very interesting texturally that you've got this sort of slow soaring melody and underneath the so much bubbling activity there. So it's one of the things on our recording that I'm most proud of because I think I feel that we've managed to accomplish those different textures pretty well on that, and I think it fits our sounds well, that piece. So I enjoy playing it, even though it still scares me.
Leah Roseman:
You're about to hear a short excerpt from Franz Schubert's Quartettsatz, which is a one movement piece that is the only surviving movement of his uncompleted 12th string quartet. (music)
Yeah, wonderful. Thanks. When you guys coach young quartets or student quartets at the university, what kinds of things did you find they have the most trouble learning?
Jameson Cooper:
Well, it feels like after a while you do it day in and day out. As a professional quartet, you sort of forget about some of the things that you take. You take certain things for granted. And it's always surprising to me how cueing has to be taught. And again, as a conductor, I just do a lot of that kind of thing anyway, but to actually have to verbalize what it means to cue somebody and what is the information you are trying to impart with that gesture? So that's a challenge. And then some people just physically don't do that. Well, some people, it's very natural. I teach conducting class here at the university, and I see that a lot. Some people, it goes and others, it's just the coordination of the physical motions is very difficult. I would say that's probably the thing that I was, I'm a little taken back by with a group that is just not naturally getting that and having to talk through it and have them try different things so they find a physical language that makes sense for the music they're about to play is always interesting.
Leah Roseman:
Do any of you find with students that they sometimes play early to their own cue or late to their own cue? You know what I mean by that?
Jameson Cooper:
We still do.
Justin Goldsmith:
I think also going back to the very beginning of what we were talking about today, the infrastructure of chamber music and how it happens for kids. I think one of the things that I feel like we have to deal with a lot is chamber music as sort of an afterthought in music education generally, kids get lessons and play an orchestra when they're serious about their instrument. And I think that chamber music often is sort of tacked on as just something to do. And I think that what that sometimes leads to is not really knowing the part, not really knowing the score, and kind of just playing. Just playing. And I think it's hard to impress upon people, young people who are already busy with tons and tons of stuff, the importance of treating this with the importance that we think it deserves. And I think that's actually one of the hardest things, I think, to deal with because it is something that we devote our lives to, and we think that it deserves that kind of treatment, that kind of importance. And that's just not true for a lot of people.
Leah Roseman:
Yeah, I remember when I was in university, it was always such a struggle to get people to actually rehearse between the coachings because there was just so much pressure to do everything else. And of course, practice for your teacher, but it's all about the rehearsing, right?
You guys did a cool piece. Did Anna Clyne write it for you? The concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra?
Jameson Cooper:
Yes. That was very recently. In October we did the premier and it was the Fishchoff National Chamber Music Association's 50th anniversary year. And so they wanted to commemorate it by commissioning a piece, which spoke to their mission. So they wanted to involve, obviously, chamber music have a representation there, but also community organizations including the local symphony, South Bend Symphony. So we were fortunate that Anna Clyne was able to write this piece for us, so it's a string quartet concerto four movement concerto, and it was based on the four seasons, not in the same order as the Vivaldi. And it was really cool texturally, it's a very interesting piece that the way she works at the combination of the quartet or with the orchestra or the quartet standing in relief, it was a really fun thing to dive into. And luckily she was able to come out to the premiere as well, so she got to work with us a little bit and listened to it. And a good time was had by all.
Leah Roseman:
I was thinking if there's more repertoire like that, do you think it would help bring symphony audiences into chamber music concerts if they're not already into it?
Jameson Cooper:
That's a good question. I mean, it really doesn't feel like chamber music. I think that's the thing. I think it might get audiences interested in the personalities of that group, but I don't think you'd have any sense that, oh, I like this. Well, maybe I'd like a Mozart quartet. It just feels like quite a different animal to me. We did actually, the first half of that concert was just us alone. So maybe that concert functioned in the way you described it. I don't think that piece necessarily would.
Leah Roseman:
What kind of unconventional concerts do you do or settings do you do as a quartet?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
I would say largely it's been collaborative things that aren't necessarily, oh, a natural thing that you'd think about. If you think of quartet, one thing is on my mind upcoming is we're collaborating with a librarian who has an ongoing story time series program for young kids. So I've worked with her a couple of times on pairing different children's books with different pieces of music or excerpts from a certain composer to tell a certain story that's really, really bite-size and user-friendly for a 4-year-old. But it still kind of gives you a sense of, oh wait, there is storytelling naturally involved when you are playing chamber music. So that's been really fun. Last year was, well, the book came out a couple of years ago, but on the life of Florence Price, and the book was written by actually school aged children. And so we kind of combined that book with a Dr. Seuss book on emotions with the music of Florence Price and kind of integrated that. And so this was in this storytelling space with the cute carpet and the kids sitting on the letters. So that was really fun. And we're going to do another one in two weeks. And so that will be more about dancing and what kinds of forms dancing will take, and we'll use not just one composer's music. So that'll be another window of Giraffes Can't Dance. I don't know if you're familiar with that one, but so it invites kids to feel like they can dance, they can play music. If one piece doesn't speak to them, another piece might. So that's been fun. We've also done a name that tune kind of a thing that gets into the video game world at the, well, this was also the library, but a different kind of cross section of the library's goers. So we did a kind of trivia-style little playing of excerpts in this kind of tech space of the library, this Studio 304. So those have been really fun. Were you
Leah Roseman:
Were you playing video game music?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
We were, yes. Yeah. Justin, I'm sure can talk a lot about video games, but he put together some arrangements for us so we could use those. And some of them were obvious and some of them really catered to the, you really have to love video games to recognize this particular tune and this particular, I don't know, scene of a game. It got really specific.
Leah Roseman:
Luis, you had something you were going to say?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Yeah, I just remember one of the things, one of the reasons, well, okay, so when we learn about the Anna Clyne project, we wanted to book something by Anna Clyne in one of our quartet concerts at IUSB. And then we booked, we put a piece by her that it's with electronic music. And that was very difficult to do, actually playing along with a recording and being mic'ed, that was very unusual for us. There was a whole preparation that was to be done with the microphone setting and all that stuff, the sound of the quartet, all the projects that we've done. Actually a few years ago, we did a concerto for Koto and quartet. It wasn't a concerto, but it was, I don't know if Jamie remembers, but it's a piece for quartet and Koto, a Japanese Koto, and it was played by a very famous Koto player from Japan.
That was very cool. And also another very interesting project that we did through the Carnegie Hall relationship. After the thing we did with the Emerson Quartet, we were asked to go back to New York to do a piece which was written for children, is a story that we will play the music of the story. So as the kids were watching a video of the story, we were actually the music as we were playing. So a little bit like old time movie theater with the organ playing and silent movies. So that was really difficult to, to try to coordinate exactly with what was happening up in the screen. That's very unusual.
Leah Roseman:
I mean, we do that as an orchestra, but we depend on the conductor. How did this work in the quartet?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
We did not have a conductor, so we had to really be very attentive of what was happening. But obviously there were two members of the quartet were completely giving the back to it, so those who were more able to, Jamie for instance, was able to watch being the sort of the cuer, cueing the quartet as whatever's happening. So he was constantly watching up there, what was happening.
Leah Roseman:
I forget, Justin, in your quartet, do you sit with the cello on the outside or inside?
Justin Goldsmith:
So I grew up sitting on the inside, and that was always my preference for a long time. With my old group, with the Spaniards, they had a more European sensibility, and so I sat on the outside there, and I grew to understand that and have a way of doing things that I think worked. And now we're doing that here as well. And I think it does kind of feel good to sit on the inside in the sense that you're facing outwards and you can feel like you're projecting more directly at the risk of being hubristic or whatever. I believe that I have a large enough sound that I can sit on the outside and I don't have to worry about projecting directly at the audience in that way. So I'm kind of fine with either way. And when we were talking, when I first joined the group, we brought that up and I'm fine with either way, and I think Luis wanted to try it sitting on the inside so that the classic problem of viola sitting on the outside is that you always have to keep doing that. And we wanted to try to do that a little bit less. And I think we we're feeling good with it, for now.
Leah Roseman:
I always prefer having the cellist on the outside because it seems to me the second violin and viola, it makes so much sense to be close to each other. And I never understood why the violist has to be twisting, and yeah, the cello is such a big instrument, but so many cellists I've played with are like, "no, I sit on the inside, that's the way it goes". And I think it's this projection idea. I'm never quite clear on this, but it's amazing what a difference just a foot can make, right ? In the whole, your emotions of what's going on.
Justin Goldsmith:
Yeah, I think in the end, I don't think it makes an enormous difference in the sound. I think it does make a difference in the sound. I think the choice in my mind, should come down to what makes the players feel most comfortable. And in this case, it is cello on the outside.
Leah Roseman:
So if you guys want to think about the rehearsal process, if someone wants to speak to that, just like when you have a new piece, let's say.
Jameson Cooper:
Well, I think that's probably changed a little bit over the years. I think we now more a group that will try to speak less at first and not try to work out the minutia of things from the get go, but try to get more of a feel for the piece or bigger picture than press. We used to. So first couple of rehearsals, if we're doing up-bow and that person's doing down-bow, okay, fine, we'll figure it out later. But just things like the overall architecture of the piece, the tempos, things like that. Those are the sort of bigger picture things that we'll try to just let those naturally find their way into our system by just playing and not gas them so much. And then once you know it, then of course then you start getting into the more detailed things of how do you really clean it up. But I think it is like you're coming from a great height and then you're moving closer and closer and closer and towards this. So you're finally able to see it's on Google Earth when you can zoom out and then you can come back in. And so we start in space and arrive at an up-bow in great detail.
Leah Roseman:
So Luis, I'm curious. We talked a little bit about what a string quartet career looks like, and looking back if you guys had been able to be a quartet, maybe like the Emerson or one of these big names that was really relying on touring a lot, but that would've affected your personal life and the way, you know what I mean, in terms of your day to day, right?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Yeah. I mean it's definitely a compromise that you had to make. Particularly, I mean, if you're on the road so much of the time, I mean, if you have other commitments like teaching particularly that could be rescheduled. I mean a lot of the time that could be done, like private lessons and things like that could be done. But there are classes in-person classes that you can't really do much with. So being on the road all the time, it's a little challenging when you have a residency, a teaching residency. But yeah, I mean a lot of Justin was talking about that, there's that exist. I mean, there's a niche, there's groups that live purely off of just performing only, and it's very impressive. It's very impressive that they could do that.
Leah Roseman:
But do you think it puts more pressure on the quartet interpersonally because it's so much altogether?
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Possibly. I mean, I would say, I know that there are quartets that have had to take their time off when they're traveling and they do their own schedules and they travel separately. I mean, we go back to the Guarneri quartet, I guess, and then they just simply meet on the spot, just play the concert and ,"Goodbye. I don't see you until next concert." I mean, obviously there's personal issues that go along with being 24 7, the whole time sharing time, your personal space. And obviously that could be challenging, I guess, I imagine. It hasn't happened to us. I mean, we seem to have a lot of fun when we're traveling,
Leah Roseman:
But that's what I'm thinking, because you're not traveling all the time, so it's more special when you tour, right? Yeah.
Luis Enrique Vargas:
Yeah,
Aviva Hakanoglu:
That's true.
Leah Roseman:
So Aviva, maybe if you could reflect on your role as a teacher, what kind of things you think are most important to work on with your violin students?
Aviva Hakanoglu:
That is very dependent on the student. I will say in my capacity, just generally teaching because I don't only teach violin, especially at IUSB, listening to the specific needs and learning styles of students. One-on-one, sure, chamber groups. Yes. Classroom setting as well. That is very interesting, especially for me as someone who, I've done a lot of schooling, and so I know that my learning style is very different from a lot of the students who I do teach. So coming up with creative ways and multiple ways of presenting information, whether it's a technical skill, whether it's music, historical information, whether it's an ear training concept, whatever it is. So yeah, I think the finding multiple ways of expressing a concept that either it's become ingrained and I don't even think about it, so I have to think about it or something that I'm struggling with currently. And so it's really on my mind and I'm working through it. And then I am also working through it with a student. And then I think the other thing is this probably goes for whether you're a student or not, the more invested you feel in something, the more committed and motivated you are to work on it. So finding ways, understanding what motivates students just in general, what is of interest to them, and finding ways to connect a concept you're trying to teach to that I think goes a long way in just kind of getting everyone to the same level of desire of understanding something. So yeah, I think that goes to the listening side of things. Yeah.
Leah Roseman:
Beautiful. Justin. Okay. So what should we talk about? Maybe it would be interesting just to reflect. We talked a little bit about presenting concerts in different ways, and what do you think about that in terms of burnout as a performer? Just being able to think outside the box.
Justin Goldsmith:
I think burnout is kind of a hard topic to discuss, not just because it's sort of touchy, but also because it's different for different people. I think it is possible to get burnt out of just performing. It is possible to get burnt out of anything if you just do it a lot. So I do think that finding variety in the types of performances that you do is an important thing. And not just to avoid burnout. I think I said this before, but I really value versatility and being able to go into any kind of performance situation or teaching situation or anything like that, and be able to do what you need to do. So I think, of course, avoiding burnout is something that I think we all want to do, and I think that finding variety in the activities that you do is probably one of the best ways to do that. So in terms of performance, yeah, I do think it's important to find different venues, different audiences, different repertoire, just all different stuff to just keep things fresh and also to kind of stretch yourself so that you don't kind of get stuck in your particular mode of doing things.
Leah Roseman:
Well, thanks so much for your perspectives. It was a thrill to meet you all today and be able to do this with the whole quartet.
Justin Goldsmith:
Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 6:
Yeah, thanks.
Jameson Cooper:
All right, well thank you so much.
Leah Roseman:
I hope you enjoyed this episode. Pleased to share this with your friends and check out episodes you may have missed at leahroseman.com. If you could buy me a coffee to support this series, that would be wonderful. The link is in the description. Have a wonderful week.
