Arts & Humanities Society & Culture

Jupiter String Quartet to give concerts at UGA

Jupiter String Quartet group-h
Jupiter String Quartet

Athens, Ga. – The University of Georgia Performing Arts Center will present the Jupiter String Quartet with guests clarinetist Jon Manasse and pianist Jon Nakamatsu April 20 at 8 p.m. in Hodgson Concert Hall.

The Jupiter Quartet will also perform a free concert at noon that day at the UGA Chapel.

The Jupiter String Quartet consists of violinists Nelson Lee and Megan Freivogel, violist Liz Freivogel (who is Megan’s older sister) and cellist Daniel McDonough (who is Megan’s husband and Liz’s brother-in-law).

The quartet regularly performs across the U.S., Canada, Europe, Asia and South America. The group is the string quartet-in-residence at the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana.

The ensemble has received an Avery Fisher Career Grant and the Cleveland Quartet Award from Chamber Music America. They were also awarded first prize in the Banff International String Quartet Competition and grand prize in the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition.

For this project, the quartet is joined by members of the Manasse/Nakamatsu Duo. The program will showcase rarely heard quintet masterpieces.

The Manasse/Nakamatsu Duo is comprised of Manasse, who served as the principal clarinetist of the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, and Nakamatsu, the gold medalist of the 10th Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. Together they have toured throughout the U.S. and have recorded a CD of the Brahms clarinet sonatas that The New York Times called “impeccable.”

The Jupiter Quartet’s Hodgson Hall program will include two quintet masterpieces from Brahms, the Clarinet Quintet in B Minor and the Piano Quintet in F Minor. The concert will be recorded for national broadcast on American Public Media’s Performance Today, heard by 1.4 million listeners across the country.

Tickets for the concert are $35 and are discounted for UGA students. Tickets can be purchased at the Performing Arts Center box office, online at pac.uga.edu or by calling 706-542-4400 or toll free at 888-289-8497.

The performance underwriters are Thomas and Jean Lauth.