Kaunas String Quartet — 45 Years

Celebrating 45 years of artistic activity, the Kaunas String Quartet is one of Lithuania’s most established and prominent chamber music ensembles. With this concert, the quartet aims not only to mark the anniversary of its work, but also to nurture chamber music traditions, promote Lithuanian music, and bring together works from different eras and styles in a unified artistic programme, in collaboration with Lithuanian performers. For the occasion, the quartet has chosen a programme combining Lithuania’s musical heritage with masterpieces of world classical music.

The concert will feature String Quartet No. 1 by Julius Juzeliūnas, whose 110th birth anniversary is being commemorated. It is one of the composer’s most significant chamber works, revealing his distinctive musical language and modernist means of expression. Juzeliūnas’s work made a significant contribution to the development of Lithuania’s 20th- and 21st-century compositional school, the evolution of a modern musical language, and the strengthening of national identity.

The quartet will also perform Giedrius Kuprevičius’s “Songs of a One-Day Homeland,” adding a contemporary reflection on national identity and cultural memory. The texts were prepared using the works of Jonas Kossu-Aleksandravičius, Justinas Marcinkevičius, Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas and Gintaras Patackas, as well as Lithuanian folk poetic tradition and the semantics and symbolism of the Lithuanian alphabet.

Alongside works by Lithuanian composers, the programme will include a masterpiece of the Romantic era: César Franck’s String Quintet in F minor, considered one of the most mature works in the composer’s chamber music repertoire. The surprise of this festive evening will be a miniature for string quartet written especially for the occasion by Kasparas Šerpytis, interwoven with Lithuanian quotations and witty humour.

This concert is a significant cultural event that brings together the ensemble’s extensive experience, Lithuania’s musical heritage and the European classical tradition, creating enduring artistic value and strengthening the cultural identity of Kaunas and Lithuania.