Turtle Island String Quartet by Anna

I really enjoyed the Turtle Island Quartet. My expectations towards the quartet weren’t too high, seeing as they were playing at 9:20 and I was afraid I might fall asleep. They proved me wrong, for it was very entertaining and I enjoyed the music a lot. I loved how they didn’t just sit there and play, but they interacted with each other and the audience and moved along with the song. It made it worthwhile to watch, because sometimes when you would watch people playing music, it’s boring to watch and you’d rather just listen to it on cd, but they made it interesting to watch. I found it fascinating how they can make their string instruments sound like any other instrument. There were times when they sounded very similar to a saxophone or the drums. I play the piano and sometimes I play pieces that are made for orchestras or string instruments and you have to play differently to make it sound like you’re playing that instrument. It’s a really cool thing to get to do and it makes playing an instrument more enjoyable when you’re able to do different things with it and produce different sounds.

I also liked how it was pretty informal and how they connected with the audience in asking us questions and joking around with us. That kept me focused and was interesting. I like how they introduced the pieces they were playing before they played them and told us a little bit about the piece.

I enjoyed hearing about them after the show too. It’s great how close they are and I think that’s what makes the show great, because they all work together nicely. They were very nice and humorous when talking with us which made it enjoyable. I found it interesting to hear that Mads Tolling gave up some big career thing (I can’t remember what it was exactly), to be in this quartet. He said his parents weren’t too pleased, but he did it because he really wanted to be in this quartet. That shows that these guys really love doing what they do and being with each other. I found that to be really cool. I think that these guys have great talent and will go very far in life.