String Quartet in the Dark

Late Beethoven in total darkness. You will hear things you never noticed.

Atelier Blau is a former painter’s studio at the top of a courtyard building on Gumpendorfer Straße: one big room, a skylight blacked out for the night and sixty chairs in a loose spiral around the players. The evening begins by candlelight. After the opening bars of the Quartet in C sharp minor, Op. 131, the four candles on the music stands are put out one at a time and the room goes completely black.

The quartet plays from memory. Without anything to look at, the inner voices come forward: the viola’s long lines, the cello’s breathing, the tiny scrape of a bow changing direction. The seven movements run without a break, about forty minutes, followed by a short candlelit talk and a glass of wine.

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