By James Kent
RUTLAND—On Saturday evening, Nov. 16, the place to be was at The Paramount Theatre. For those in attendance at the sold-out performance of the VSO’s Jukebox Quartet, the vibe was one of a secret club that you felt honored to be a part of, for this was no ordinary concert, not even by the quartet’s standards. It was a special night where Jukebox fans curated the music unleashed from the two violins, one viola, and one cello. These fans, who won a contest, chose music from a comprehensive list of past Jukebox performances.
The Jukebox, which leans on the eclectic, brought its A-game on Saturday night and started things off with a zesty performance of Elena Kats-Chernin’s “Pink Breasted Robin.” The audience of 100 people encircled the quartet in a horseshoe shape in seats arranged on stage, with the performers set on a raised platform. As people entered the theater, that exclusive feeling took shape as Paramount Theatre staff escorted people up a side entrance and onto the performance stage. It is a vantage point most uncommon for a concert-goer, leaving one with the sense that they were getting an exclusive peek behind the curtain.
These details were all foretold to the Mountain Times the week prior in an interview with Jukebox host and curator Matt LaRocca. He wasn’t wrong. Still, to hear something described is one thing; to experience it is another.
After “Pink Breasted Robin,” LaRocca took the stage to introduce the night’s program, titled “A Little Help from Our Friends.” Some people in the audience were surprised to learn about the genesis of the evening’s program. I guess those are the ones who need only to know that the Jukebox Quartet is coming to town, and they’re ready to purchase tickets no matter the theme. After experiencing this concert, I found it easy to understand why.
LaRocca introduced one of the guest curators to the second selection for the evening. Kris Karge went to the mic and explained her choice of Rhiannon Giddens’ “At the Purchaser’s Option.” The song, written by singer/performer Giddens, came about after she saw a historical document of a slave auction where a slave woman’s 9-month-old baby would be included in the sale or not, at the purchaser’s option. Understanding the intentions behind this piece of music added a context that brought additional meaning to the piece, and it was a stunner. It was a haunting feeling, shooting through the audience as if ghosts of the past were emanating from the strings of the quartet.
The third selection of the evening was a beauty of a performance, “Aheym” by Bryce Dessner. Dessner, an Ohio native and member of the band The National, designed a musical piece that is a proper workout for the strings. LaRocca joked about the piece’s physicality and got chuckles out of the quartet, but after the intense 10-minute piece was over, the crowd’s applause showed appreciation for the brilliant performance.
A noticeable thing about attending a Jukebox performance is the close relation in space between the audience and the quartet. When Brook Quiggin-Saulnier and Jane Kittredge are plucking strings on their violins at breakneck speed, or John Dunlop’s face bears the emotion of the moment on his cello, or Stefanie Taylor bobs her shoulders left and right in time with every bow stroke on her viola, you (the audience) experience it. Every note is decipherable and assignable to the instrumentalist performing them. The wonder and mystique of music-making and those walls that separate spectators from spectacle vanish within this close-knit setting. For those who wonder, “Can I enjoy classical music,” the answer becomes absolute in this environment: “Yes, you can. Yes, you can.”
LaRocca switched up the program order after the musical workout of “Aheym” with something a bit more familiar, yet every bit as unexpected from an evening of strings: Stevie Wonder’s “Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I’m Yours.” What stands out about this selection is it was the second oldest piece on the setlist.
Composer Jessie Montgomery’s 2006 piece, “Strum,” was the following selection, another jaunty number that made a perfect selection for a string quartet. And it may have been after the quartet completed this piece that Kittredge spilled some water on her pants after a brief water break, adding a humorist and human moment to the evening that continued to seal the bond between these fine musicians and an appreciative audience.
The oldest selection played during this 65-minute concert was Peter Warlock’s “Capriol Suite” from 1926. Out of all the selections, this one is the closest in similarity to the type of music one might expect to hear from a string quartet. However, its composer’s legacy is anything but ordinary. LaRocca hinted at Warlock’s nefarious past, and garnering a little history on the composer lends a bit of intrigue to the piece performed.
The final selection of the night came from another on-hand curator, Alexis Scangas, whom the Times interviewed in our Nov. 13 issue. Scangas chose David Balakrishnan’s “Spider Dreams,” a piece written for the Turtle Island Quartet. Scangas, an instructor at STARBASE, a Rutland STEM education program, elegantly spun and wove her appreciation for “Spider Dreams” into a tale of Greek mythology, setting the stage for a perfect finale from the quartet.
After the event, those who wished to speak with the performers and LaRocca could. The appreciative and accessible foursome and LaRocca proved another bonus of attending a Jukebox concert. The Jukebox series returns to the Paramount Theatre this spring with “Heavy Metal Springs.”
