Press Quotes

"Ergma, [by Xenakis] characterized by grid-like, static blocks of sound, the piece demands visceral attack and clinical precision: the JACK [Quartet] delivered both." (read full article)

- Hannah Nepil, Financial Times

"The JACK Quartet may have gained notoriety for its eclectic programming, but they will endure because they can play with a glowing, warm sound and poetic phrasing, even with simple, repetitive motifs." (read full article)

- Charles T. Downey, Washington Post

"In Ligeti's String Quartet No. 2 (1968)... It was if the players were creating a new aesthetic, in which beauty is sculpted with surgical precision..."

"After Cage's meditative String Quartet in Four Parts (1949-50), where the quartet sounded as if transformed into a ghostly viol consort, came another virtuoso tour-de force, Xenakis's Tetras, (1983). Super agile glissandos, uninhibited noise and showers of pointillism poured from the players' fingers."

"It was an astonishing evening, and it will likely remain unsurpassed in my experience for quite some time." (read full article)

- Edward Bhesania, Strad Magazine

"Their high-octane performances of [Xenakis'] works are absolutely sensational - and have become an event in every sense." (read full article)

- Stephen Brooks, Washington Post

"The freshness of JACK's approach welcomes new listeners and educated fans alike. Their interpretations bristle, sparkle, and ache." (read full article)

- Samantha Buker, Baltimore City Paper

"...the JACK ensemble dug into the scores with a keen understanding of the distinctive shapes and contours. No technical challenge seemed to give the musicians the slightest pause. Just hearing such fearless, tight playing was a valuable experience. But these guys aren't just about showing off skills of articulation; they make music. And they found in the Xenakis quartets remarkable avenues for expressive impact." (read full article)

- Tim Smith, Baltimore Sun

"JACK's performance must be considered definitive, completely mastering the idiom and the expression." (read full article)

- George Grella, Seen and Heard International

"It was delivered, though, with the kind of unfussy intensity that JACK seem to bring to everything they play. In Ligeti's Second Quartet, they combined meticulous care in realising every inflection and colour with a perfectly judged sense of the work's scope and stature. Cage's Quartet in Four Parts was guilelessly beautiful, like a series of renaissance madrigals bleached of their expressive dimensions. The Xenakis, though, was an epic tour de force. Tetras welds the instruments into a single, snarling entity, with fearsome technical challenges; yet, as well as the physicality, what emerged here was the musical structure, thrillingly conveyed." (read full article)

- Andrew Clements, Guardian

"Whether a listener absorbs this music or rebels against it is at least partly a matter of how the performers put it across. It would be hard to imagine an ensemble playing it with greater virtuosity than the JACK Quartet, which seemed not merely earnest but also completely comfortable with, and passionate about, the strange sound worlds at hand." (read full article)

- Allan Kozinn, New York Times

"...invariably extracts vital musical substance from the most oblique musical language." (read full article)

- David Patrick Stearns, Philadelphia Inquirer

"Hardly a breath was to be heard in the audience during the entire program, so concentrated were the listeners, though there was certainly a collective exhaling at the end of the Xenakis before the crowd gave the quartet a rousing ovation." (read full article)

- Daniel Hathaway, Cleveland Classical

"...JACK's vibrato-less sonority, balance and intonation were as natural as breathing...performed with uncanny dynamic control." (read full article)

- Rick Schultz, Los Angeles Times

One of "The Best New York Alt-Classical Concerts Of 2010" (read full article)

- Yuki Numata, NPR

"The four string quartets by Xenakis are at the vanguard of the versatile JACK Quartet's repertoire...this foursome has completely mastered this music." (read full article)

- Frits van der Waa, de Volkskrant

"...among the most stimulating new-music concerts of my experience." (read full article)

- David Patrick Stearns, Philadelphia Inquirer

"The string quartet may be a 250-year-old contraption, but young, brilliant groups like the JACK Quartet are keeping it thrillingly vital." (read full article)

- Thomas Huizenga, NPR

"The JACK's impassioned virtuosity hit home."

- Alex Ross, New Yorker

"The JACK Quartet is sharp and precise. They render Xenakis with passion -- powerful and lyrical at the same time." (read full article)

- Anthony Fiumara, Trouw

"...remarkably concentrated performances assuring that future JACK events will be drop-everything-and-go occasions." (read full article)

- David Patrick Stearns, Philadelphia Inquirer

"...the JACK Quartet -- a youthful group that has made its reputation almost entirely with avant-garde fare routinely fills halls for performances of Georg Friedrich Haas's Third String Quartet...The performers, who are positioned in the corners of the room, seem to map the space with tones, like bats using echolocation to navigate a lightless cave...Often, the music borders on noise: the strings emit creaks and groans, clickety swarms of pizzicato, shrill high notes, moaning glissandos. At other times, it attains an otherworldly beauty, as the players spin out glowing overtone harmonies."

- Alex Ross, New Yorker

"...gave a plush, compelling account of a new work by the young composer Caleb Burhans, Contritus, a flowing, ruminative and ravishing piece that evokes medieval and early Renaissance sacred works expressing contrition." (read full article)

- Anthony Tommasini, New York Times

"Every JACK concert transcends a run-of-the-mill performance and becomes a true event." (read full article)

- Time Out New York

"The JACK Quartet, in terrific performances, proved that the quaint old string quartet, stretched to its limits, remains vital and entertaining." (read full article)

- Tom Huizenga, Washington Post

"Mind-blowingly good...it was impossible to anticipate the primal emotions that the JACK...could create..." (read full article)

- Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times

"...a highlight of last year's CD releases." (read full article)

- David Weininger, Boston Globe

"The JACK Quartet is an up-and-coming group on the new-music scene; its recent Mode recording of the complete Iannis Xenakis quartets is revelatory. And while it was called upon to produce many of the effects in "Pression," its rendering of Lachenmann's Second String Quartet (1989) never sounded merely like the cello piece times four. Instead, a beguiling counterpoint of haunting sounds first draws listeners to the precipice of inaudibility, then steers them back toward conventional music with a single tone or chord, only to send them off again on the wings of scurrying, whispering passages. A lesser quartet might have used amplification, but the JACK's pure acoustic sound enabled a listener to savor each tiny subtle gradation."

- Christian Carey, Musical America

"...played with delicacy and poise..." (read full article)

- Joseph Dalton, Albany Times Union

"...brilliant...gave viscerally exciting performances...a tour de force of intensity and color." (read full article)

- Anthony Tommasini, New York Times

"...howlingly beautiful...Tetras seemed a riotous celebration of sound...these young players render abstruse ideas as organic gestures."

- Alex Ross, New Yorker

"...perhaps the single most intrepidly experimental quartet on the horizon...resourcefully sought the sense behind what might normally seem like noise...The JACK Quartet will simply have to be stalked." (read full article)

- Philadelphia Inquirer

"...as emphatic and fearless in its music-making as it is in its majusculed name." (read full article)

- WQXR

Best of 2009: "...one of 2009's most impressive recordings...The DVD, with its great surround sound, is the way to go, especially since you can see the black T-shirted guys in startling action..." (read full article)

- Mark Swed, Los Angeles Times

Best of 2009: "...brings out the exhilarating, visceral edge of this brainy and astringent music. For the most fearless new-music lover on your list." (read full article)

- Jeremy Eichler, Boston Globe

Best of 2009: "A mix of audacity and assurance turned this confident young ensemble's survey of thorny Xenakis compositions into a genuine event." (read full article)

- Steve Smith, Time Out New York

Best of 2009: "...exceptional...beautifully harsh Xenakis roared from my rented-car stereo during a drive into Death Valley." (read full article)

- Alex Ross, New Yorker

#1, Best of 2009: "...provides the first complete compilation of these stochastically composed works. They're witty, eccentric, challenging and worth it." (read full article)

- Nadia Sirota, NPR