Astrid Schween at her UMass office.
(Photo Credit: Jerrey Roberts for the Daily Hampshire Gazette)
John Malveaux of
www.MusicUNTOLD.com
sends this link:
Juilliard Quartet first:
http://nepr.net/news/2015/10/06/joining-juilliard-quartet-umass-cellist-astrid-schween-represents-firsts/
John
New England Public Radio
Later this year, cellist Astrid Schween will join the prominent
Juilliard Quartet. Schween has been a professor at UMass Amherst and
Mount Holyoke since 2004. When she joins the quartet, she’ll be the
first woman and first African American member in its nearly 70 year
history.
At her UMass office, Schween is giving a lesson to second-year
graduate student Sarah Bish. They’re practicing a Rachmaninoff
Sonata. Schween demonstrates a phrase, which Bish copies.
“Just really milking the string,” Schween says as she plays. “Only a piece like Rachmaninoff could take this.”
That capacity to expressively “milk” the strings, Schween says, is
part of what drew her to the instrument at an early age. She grew up in
New York City. Her parents took her to many concerts, including one at
Tanglewood.
“There was a cellist performing, and I was apparently captivated,”
Schween says. “I didn’t want to play anything else. Years later, Yo-Yo
Ma’s father came to New York to start a children’s orchestra, and I
started my first lessons with him. Within a year he prepared me to a
level where I was able to get into Juilliard Pre-College.”
Schween started that program at age 7, and went on to get her
master’s degree from Juilliard. So joining the school’s quartet will be a
homecoming. As the group’s cellist, she says she’ll do a lot of driving
of the quartet.
“I think the cello’s responsible for the timing overall, for the
propulsion of the group and the music, and for setting the sound world
on which everything else rests,” Schween says.
Schween knows she has big shoes to fill in the Juilliard Quartet.
She’s replacing Joel Krosnick, who’s retiring after 42 years. Schween’s
first performance with the group is December 12th in Detroit. She’ll
play on a Schubert quintet alongside Krosnick.
“It’ll be a chance to actually sit and play with him in the ensemble, see how he functions, how he thinks,” Schween says.
While Schween will be the first woman and first African American in
the quartet, she says practicing with the group will occupy much of her
time, and those factors will become less important.
