Cassatt String Quartet

String Quartet No. 16 in E-flat major, K.428

by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

1. Allegro non troppo
2. Andante con moto
3. Menuetto
4. Allegro vivace

Strum

by Jessie Montgomery 

- Intermission -

String Quartet No.14 in F-sharp Major, Op. 142

by Dmitri Shostakovich 

1. Allegretto
2. Adagio
3. Allegretto

The Cassatt String Quartet

• Muneko Otani, violin
• Jennifer Leshnower, violin
• Emily Brandenburg, viola
• Gwen Krosnick, cello

Cassatt String Quartet

Hailed for its “mighty rapport and relentless commitment,” the Cassatt String Quartet has performed throughout the world for four decades, with appearances at Alice Tully Hall and Weill Recital Hall; Tanglewood Music Center; the Kennedy Center; Théâtre des Champs-Élysées; Centro National de las Artes; Maeda Hall; and Beijing’s Central Conservatory. The Cassatts have given concerts on the quartet of Stradivari instruments at the Library of Congress; and, as resident quartet at the University of Buffalo, performed three complete Slee Beethoven String Quartet cycles.

The Cassatt Quartet, founded in 1985, joyfully approaches its 40th year, to be celebrated with an array of collaborations, concerts, and contemporary music. Their anniversary calendar will include a busy schedule of performances in the U.S. and internationally, including an Italian tour alongside guitarist Eliot Fisk; recording the great quartet Modes by Dorothy Rudd Moore, alongside other string quartets by Black American women; teaching residencies at major universities and conservatories; and, in proud Cassatt Quartet fashion, premieres of important commissions, including a piano quintet by Victoria Bond and a new work for string quartet by Joan Tower, to be premiered at Maverick Concerts in September 2025. The CSQ will premiere new works written for them, as well, by Mari Kimura and Shirish Korde; share performances with pianists Magdalena Baczewska and Emely Phelps, with clarinetist Bixby Kennedy, and with jazz singer Dominique Eade; and appear in concert across the Northeast and Midwest United States.

The Quartet’s prolific discography includes over forty recordings, among them performances of music by Steven Stucky, Daniel S. Godfrey, Gerald Cohen, Sebastian Currier, and Samuel Adler. They have recorded for the Koch, Naxos, New World, Point, CRI, Tzadik, and Albany labels. The CSQ’s playing has been featured on NPR’s “Performance Today,” WGBH Boston, WQXR and WNYC of New York, Canada’s CBC Radio, and Radio France. The Cassatt’s projects have been featured three times in Alex Ross’s “10 Best Classical Recordings” column in The New Yorker.

The Cassatts, devoted to nurturing young musicians, have given classes at Columbia, Cornell, Princeton, and Syracuse Universities; the University of Pennsylvania and Bard Conservatory of Music; the American Academy in Rome and the Toho School in Tokyo; and the Bowdoin International Music Festival. The CSQ has been in residence since 1995 at the Seal Bay Festival of American Chamber Music in Vinalhaven, Maine; and, since 2005, at Cassatt in the Basin, an educational residency in West Texas. The CSQ’s members hold teaching positions at Columbia University, Williams College, Riverdale Country School, and Kneisel Hall.

The members of the Cassatt Quartet are violinists Muneko Otani and Jennifer Leshnower; violist Emily Brandenburg; and cellist Gwen Krosnick. The Quartet is named for Mary Cassatt, the great 19th- and 20th-century painter who – in addition to being the only American to exhibit in Paris alongside the Impressionists – did devoted, lifelong work in support of women’s equality and right to vote.

Muneko Otani, violin

Violinist Muneko Otani has appeared worldwide as chamber musician and leading violin pedagogue for over forty years. As first violinist of the Cassatt String Quartet since 1986, Otani has appeared in the United States, Canada, and Mexico, as well as in Europe and Asia. Major venues have included Lincoln Center, the Kennedy Center, Jordan Hall, the Library of Congress, Palacio de Bellas Artes, and the Bastille Opera House.

As a chamber musician, Otani has collaborated with Walter Trampler, Martin Lovett, Marc Johnson, Paul Katz, Kazuhide Isomura, Ursula Oppens, Masuko Ushioda, Colin Carr, and Lawrence Lesser. With the CSQ, she has held fellowships at the Banff Centre, the Tanglewood Music Center, and Norfolk Chamber Music Festival; and, at Yale University, as assistant to the Tokyo Quartet.

Otani is a devoted and experienced teacher, and serves on the faculties of Williams College and of Columbia University’s Music Performance Program, the latter a position she has held for nearly thirty years. She has taught at the Mozarteum Summer Academy in Salzburg and as assistant to Lewis Kaplan at the Mannes College of Music; and served as a panelist for the Juilliard Concerto Competition, the 2019 Postacchini International Violin competition, the Barlow Prize for composition, and Chamber Music America’s Residency Program.

Muneko Otani received a Bachelor of Music degree in both Performance and Education from the Toho Academy of Music in Japan, where she studied with Toshiya Eto. She continued her training at the New England Conservatory, where her principal teachers were Masuko Ushioda and Louis Krasner. Otani plays a 1770 J. B. Guadagnini of Parma violin.

Jennifer Leshnower, violin

Jennifer Leshnower, second violinist of the Cassatt Quartet, has performed across North and Central America, Europe, and Asia. She is the founder and director of Cassatt in the Basin — a chamber music residency established in 2005 in West Texas, where Leshnower grew up — which presents educational events across the Permian Basin multiple times annually.

As a chamber musician, Leshnower has played with members of the Cleveland, Tokyo, Vermeer, Orion and Amadeus Quartets; pianists Marc-André Hamelin, Ursula Oppens and Lydia Artymiw; flutist Ransom Wilson; and cellist Colin Carr. She has championed new music, including collaborations with leading 21st-century composers including John Corigliano, Kaija Saariaho, Joan Tower, Augusta Read Thomas, Yehudi Wyner and Peter Schickele. Leshnower is a former member of the Thouvenel String Quartet and the Midland-Odessa Symphony, and joined the Cassatt Quartet in 1994. In 2006, she had the opportunity to perform with the CSQ at the Library of Congress on the Library’s “Ward” Stradivari.

Leshnower’s chamber music teaching has brought her to young musicians worldwide, including in masterclasses in Italy’s Orvieto Musica, Mexico’s San Miguel Chamber Music Festival, Ireland’s Trinity College and Royal Irish Academy of Music, Bowdoin International Music Festival, Syracuse University, and the University of Pennsylvania.

Leshnower studied at the Shepherd School of Music at Rice University with Sergiu Luca, and at the Peabody Conservatory with Sylvia Rosenberg. She participated in the Meadowmount and Aspen Music Festivals, the National Repertory Orchestra having coached with members of the Guarneri, Tokyo and Juilliard Quartets. Leshnower performs on a rare 1655 Jacobus Stainer violin.

Emily Brandenburg, viola

Violist Emily Brandenburg, who joined the Cassatt String Quartet in 2024, is known for her fiercely committed and thoughtful artistry. She is a passionate chamber musician, with a complex and unique low-voice sound that blends elements of deep expressivity and introspection.

Emily Brandenburg has enjoyed a varied career focused on chamber music, solo projects, and orchestral playing in equal measure. She has performed with large ensembles such as the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and Albany and Portland Symphonies; and with chamber music groups including the Metropolis Ensemble and the Frisson Chamber Ensemble. She has served as Artist-in-Residence at the University of Evansville, principal violist of the Evansville Philharmonic, and violist of the Eykamp String Quartet; and appeared at Yellow Barn, Norfolk, Bowdoin, Rome, and Amelia Island chamber music festivals.

Brandenburg, an avid lover of new music, has shared recent projects that include recording and premiering an album by singer/songwriter Emily Wells; commissioning a new work from composer Will Rowe; and, most recently, “Telekinesis,” a large-scale project with the Metropolis Ensemble, Brooklyn Youth Choir, and The Crossing Choir to record the music of Tyondai Braxton. Brandenburg’s championing of contemporary music – and particularly the music of women composers – continues with joining the Cassatt Quartet, with whom she will premiere works by Joan Tower, Victoria Bond, and Mari Kimura.

Emily Brandenburg holds degrees from Yale University, New England Conservatory, and the McDuffie Center for Strings. She is a certified Suzuki teacher, and her experiences growing up — beginning formal training at five, and surrounded by grandparents, parents, and five siblings who were musicians — solidified her belief that all children, and all music students, can grow to succeed and deeply love music if nurtured. In fall 2024, Brandenburg joins the faculty of Riverdale Country School, teaching both viola and violin.

Gwen Krosnick, cello

Gwen Krosnick, cellist of the Cassatt Quartet,has appeared across the world as recitalist, chamber musician, and joyous advocate for music. Her career spans devoted quartet and trio playing, solo cello recitals, teaching at major universities and chamber music festivals, writing on music, and countless premieres and performances of contemporary music. Krosnick is known for her ecstatic and luminous voice; for her deep, burnished palette of sounds at the cello; and for a fierce technique that etches her gestures, colors, and bass lines with arresting conviction.

Highlights of Krosnick’s upcoming seasons include solo cello recitals focused on works by Tania León, Ralph Shapey, Donald Martino, James Lee III, and Dorothy Rudd Moore; quartet tours in the U.S. and Europe; premieres of new works by Joan Tower, Victoria Bond, and Christian Wolff; and – with colleagues Laurie Smukler and Qing Jiang – performing and recording the piano trios of Weinberg and Shostakovich.

Krosnick joined the Cassatt Quartet in 2022, and with her CSQ colleagues specializes both in joyful reimaginings of standard quartet repertoire and in a vast range of contemporary music – with particular emphasis on the music of women and other composers whose backgrounds have been underrepresented on classical music stages. Prior to joining the quartet, Krosnick was the founding cellist of Trio Cleonice, with which ensemble she performed across the United States, Europe, and Asia from 2008 to 2016.

Krosnick has served on the faculties of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, New England Conservatory Preparatory Division, and Junior Greenwood; and given masterclasses at Eastman, Oberlin, Cleveland Institute, and Duke. In Fall 2024, she joins the faculty of Columbia University’s Music Performance Program; she will spend the Spring 2025 semester as Visiting Professor of Cello at Oberlin Conservatory. During the summers, Krosnick teaches at Kneisel Hall, of which she is a longtime alumna, and where she has served as Artist-Faculty since 2019.

GwenKrosnick.com

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