Elena Ruehr - Quartet No. 8 "Insect Dances"
Elena Ruehr -
Quartet No. 8 "Insect Dances"
Elena Ruehr's eighth string quartet is exactly what one expects and hopes for from a 21st century piece of programmatic music. In the form of a six-movement dance suite, each movement of the quartet depicts various insects, a spider, dragonfly, wasp, bumblebee, ladybug, and grasshopper respectfully. Ruehr's colorful portrait makes each bug instantly audible, even to the most amateur and naïve audience members. Engaging character themes and motives, along with a clear formal structure allow Ruehr's goal of Insect Dances to be a piece of memorable contemporary classical music for children to come to full fruition. Ruehr calls these insect melodies 'tunes', although they are often too developed and harmonically intricate to be easily singable, not that that is at all a pejorative aspect.
The only complaint I have with Ruehr's incredibly captivating string quartet is the at times uncomfortably cliché endings to each movement. While this can be explained as being part of the formal structure of her modern take on a dance suite or as a way for kids to quickly recognize the closure to each movement, the sudden abruptness to each short movement kept drawing me out of the musical experience, before the next movement brought me right back into it.
Insect Dances was stunningly prepared and premiered by QuartetES. They were able to pull a tremendous amount of musicality out of each insect, creating an overall engaging and simply fun performance. I for one, cannot wait until Insect Dances reaches its full potential as a planned multimedia presentation, with an accompanying animated video story to present to young and old audiences everywhere.
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