Winter Concert featuring The Balourdet Quartet

Members attended the Academy's 2024 Winter Concert, featuring the Balourdet Quartet’s performance of Beethoven’s String Quartet Op. 130, with Grosse Fugue Op. 133 and Alternate Finale.

Beethoven’s groundbreaking quartet Opus 130 stretched the boundaries of what was possible in music in 1825. He was, in fact, such a maverick that the original finale (the “Great Fugue”) sparked massive controversy at its premiere for being so thunderous and electric. Beethoven agreed to write an alternate ending that was more congenial in character yet no less sophisticated for the work’s publication, which became the very last piece he ever wrote in his life. In celebrating the many sides of this multifaceted maestro, The Balourdet Quartet played the work with the original ending and then provided the alternate as a delightful and thought-provoking encore. Read more about the quartet.