Kronos Quartet
Three BonesA multimedia concert experience celebrating the power of listening through stories of American cultures that meld, layer and endure. In honor of America's 250th anniversary.
We experience a world of sound thanks to the three smallest bones in our bodies. These tiny bones in our ears—the malleus (hammer), incus (anvil) and stapes (stirrup)—amplify faint vibrations from the outside world, enabling our minds to transform these signals into the aural landscape we know.
Three Bones combines music, storytelling, vintage recordings, video elements and visual arts to share vivid histories and amplify. Kronos is joined by an array of luminary special guests to bring three of these American stories to life.
The first segment, Ground, interlaces historical recordings from 1899 with the contemporary musical approaches of composers such as Raven Chacon and Tanya Tagaq. The work centers guest artist Laura Ortman in a visceral performance of her music on Apache violin, electric violin, and vocals, against projected visuals developed by multimedia artist Jeffrey Gibson.
The second segment, At the Sea Islands, featuring percussionist Quentin Baxter, is a tribute to the work of linguist Lorenzo Dow Turner, highlighting direct connections among the cultures of Western Africa and the United States that were nearly lost to history. This segment ties historical recordings of Amelia's Song and Kumbaya to the contemporary approaches of composers Charlton Singleton and Trevor Weston.
The third segment, Beyond the Golden Gate, is commissioned by the Hop and features pipa virtuoso Wu Man, an artist in residence with the Music Department. The section explores how Chinese Americans have harnessed the US legal system to define and expand civil and immigrant rights. The recorded voice of cultural historian David Lei orates this history to works written by composers Dai Wei, Tan Dun and Wu Man herself.
Three Bones features full length projected concert visuals developed by filmmaker and new media artist Xuan, as well as additional video by multimedia artist Jeffrey Gibson and fiber artist Windy Chien.
Funded in part by the Frank L. Harrington 1924 Fund No. 3, the Wetzel Family Fund for the Arts and the Class of 1961 Legacy: The American Tradition in Performance Fund.
Photo by C. Elliott Photography
For over 50 years, San Francisco's Kronos Quartet has reimagined what the string quartet experience can be. One of the most celebrated and influential groups of our era, Kronos has given thousands of concerts worldwide, released more than 70 recordings, and collaborated with many of the world's most accomplished composers and performers across many genres. Kronos has received more than 40 awards, including three Grammys and the Polar Music, Avery Fisher, and Edison Klassiek Oeuvre Prizes. In 2024, Kronos' Pieces of Africa album was inducted into the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress. Most recently, Kronos Quartet has been selected as the Doomsday Clock Artists in Residence for The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. Through its nonprofit organization, Kronos Performing Arts Association (KPAA), Kronos has commissioned more than 1,100 works and arrangements for quartet. KPAA also manages Kronos' concert tours, local performances, recordings, and education programs. In its most ambitious commissioning effort to date, KPAA has recently completed Kronos Fifty for the Future. Through this initiative, Kronos has commissioned—and distributed online for free 50 new works for string quartet designed for students and emerging professionals, written by composers from around the world.
A soloist musician, composer, and vibrant collaborator, Laura Ortman creates across multiple platforms, including recorded albums, live performances, and filmic and artistic soundtracks. An inquisitive and exquisite violinist, Ortman is versed in Apache violin, piano, electric guitar, keyboards, and amplified violin, and often sings through a megaphone. She is a producer of capacious field recordings.
Quentin Baxter is a Grammy Award–winning artist and co-collaborator in Ranky Tanky. Quentin is a master percussionist who specializes in bringing Gullah traditions to new settings.
Wu Man is an internationally acclaimed pipa player and frequent collaborator with the Kronos Quartet.
Xuan is a new media artist, filmmaker and pianist working at the intersection of music, visual art and technology. A classically trained pianist with a passion for visual music, she actively develops innovative, cross-disciplinary projects that broaden the scope of performance practice. Driven by alterity, asymmetry and multicultural identity, her work encompasses abstract scenography, experimental animation, music video, audio-visual installations, site-responsive forms and large-scale projection mapping.
“the original rock band of string quartets”
The Washington Post
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