Nearly every weekday morning, the members of Duke's Ciompi Quartet squeeze into violinist Eric Pritchard's office on the Duke campus for a 2 1/2-hour rehearsal. The four musicians know each other well after spending 11 years together, trying to get to the heart of the music they love. But they still challenge each other to create the special mixture of old and new music that is the Ciompi signature.
"You get very real with people when you work with them so closely," says Pritchard. "It's intense, but you're working for a common purpose."
"We argue sometimes because we have different ideas," says violinist Hsiao-mei Ku. "But if you always agree about music, you're boring. What is growing? It's hassle, it's frustration. It's not taking it easy."
Ciompi Audio
"Dunklet Tropfe" from Hindemith's Melancholie, Op. 13
"On Wenlock Edge" from Ralph Vaughn Williams
String Quartet No. 2, Opus 92 by Prokofiev
When it was founded in 1965 by violinist Giorgio Ciompi, the Ciompi Quartet was one of only a handful of string quartets based in the South. From the beginning, its members have served the Duke community as full-time faculty in the music department and as active performing artists.
Although the group undertakes one or two international tours each season (they're considering a trip to Germany in the fall), they usually are in Durham, teaching and rehearsing. They perform in venues large and small: In addition to the four major concerts they perform at Duke each year, there are others at retirement centers, in residence halls and at other local universities.
"Chamber music is such a rewarding undertaking," Ku says. "You feel your contribution is important because a small, tight group can't function without everyone. I grow as an artist and a person by making this kind of music. You learn how to give, how to be a good partner, how to control your ego and let others shine for the sake of the team."
In addition to Ku and Pritchard (who joined 11 years ago), the quartet includes violist Jonathan Bagg and Fred Raimi. Raimi, the group's cellist since 1974, is the longest-serving of the quartet's current members.
"This is the longest any four players have been together in the Ciompi's history," says Raimi. "The fact that we've been stable for 11 years means that we've grown accustomed to each other. Over time, the group has acquired a personality."
A key part of that personality is the group's commitment to preserving the traditional string quartet repertoire (think Mozart, Haydn and Beethoven) while promoting new works in the genre.
"We like to perform the best masterworks," Ku says. "But we're living in the 21st century. We aren't just artists of the past, so we have lots of new commissions."
One of these, Marc Faris's "Mountain Music," was performed by the Ciompi Quartet and saxophonist Branford Marsalis in Page Auditorium in November. Faris, who received his Ph.D. in composition from Duke in 2003, is one of several recent graduates whose works have been championed by the group.
The Ciompi Quartet's upcoming concert on Feb. 24 in the Nelson Music Room will feature a new work for oboe and string quartet by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Robert Ward, a professor emeritus in Duke's music department.
Joseph Robinson, former principal oboist of the New York Philharmonic and artist-in-residence at Duke, will perform with the quartet.
"Joseph Robinson is an illustrious musician, and we haven't done much with oboe and string quartet in the past, so this is new and exciting for us," Bagg says. The collaboration will continue into the spring, when the Ciompi Quartet and Robinson embark on a tour of the Pacific Northwest and play a concert in New York.
"Touring is an important part of our job, just like teaching and performing," says Bagg. "When we tour, we're representing Duke nationally and internationally."
After four decades, quartet members say they still feel they have more to offer the community — and that the quartet continues to offer them challenges.
"I never feel bored," Ku says. "There's so much ahead of me that I want to learn and pass on to my students. The longer I work in the quartet, the more I feel lucky. And because we're lucky, we have to do the best we can."