String Quartet 'Brooklyn Rider'

The string quartet that plays the world. Brooklyn Rider.

Say string quartet and you’ll think classical. Say classical and you may think old.  Over.  But in the right hands, everything old is new again, and then some.

Take two violins, a viola, a cello.  Add the world.  Persian, Silk Road,  Bartok, Beethoven, Roma, klezmer, Minnesota, Brooklyn, Philip Glass – and you’ve got Brooklyn Rider.  The spell-casting, trail-blazing string quartet out of Brooklyn and all over.

This hour, On Point:  they’re with us live.  Brooklyn Rider and their latest album – “A Walking Fire."
-- Tom Ashbrook

The four members of Brooklyn Rider, the Brooklyn-based string quartet. Their new album, out this week, is "A Walking Fire."

Nicholas Cords, violist.

Johnny Gandelsman, violinist.

Colin Jacobsen, violinist.

Eric Jacobsen, cellist.

Brooklyn Rider performed live for On Point:

Time Out Hong Kong: Brooklyn Rider Return! — "Ever engaging, charismatic, boundary-pushing and perspective-shifting, avant garde string quartet Brooklyn Rider are one of the most exciting names in classical music. Ahead of their return to Hong Kong – their third trip in just over 18 months – for concerts in the Premiere Performances Recital Series and PLAY! Series, we chat with the foursome, Eric Jacobsen, Colin Jacobsen, Johnny Gandelsman and Nicholas Cord, about their growing affinity to Hong Kong and their just- released new album, A Walking Fire."

NPR Music: Kickstarting Classical Musicans, One Pledge at a Time — "After setting out to raise $30,000 to fund their latest album, Seven Steps (an excellent program that was featured in our "First Listen" series), the string quartet Brooklyn Rider attracted more than $50,000 from fans. And an open-source, non-profit project called Musopen, which is dedicated to creating copyright-free recordings, scores and other materials for the music of great masters like Beethoven, Brahms and Tchaikovsky earned more than $68,000 in funding, well outpacing the original goal of just $11,000."

Wall Street Journal: Unlocking the Old Chamber — "Make it new!" was the battle cry with which the poet Ezra Pound pushed for a modernism that remained true to the great art of the past. It's also the motto of Brooklyn Rider, a string quartet comprising violinists Johnny Gandelsman and Colin Jacobsen, violist Nicholas Cords and Mr. Jacobsen's brother, Eric, on cello. The group advocates a new kind of "porous" chamber music that is open to influences from other art forms.

Brooklyn Rider's performance for NPR Music's Tiny Desk Concert: