Jupiter String Quartet - Undreamed Shores (CD)

Undreamed Shores brings together three major contemporary string quartets written for and performed by the Jupiter String Quartet, works the ensemble has lived with in performance over many years. In To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores, Michi Wiancko traces a sequence of vividly imagined musical scenes inspired by the natural world. Across seven concise movements, the music reflects on fragility, ecological loss, and kinship, gradually moving toward a quietly hopeful call for collective responsibility. Composed during the pandemic, Stephen Andrew Taylor's Chaconne/Labyrinth is built around a repeating harmonic cycle, using just intonation to evoke the tension of being caught between stasis and searching. Familiar material continually returns, reshaped by a sense of uncertainty before leading toward clarity. Completing the album, Kati Agócs's Imprimatur (String Quartet No. 2) unfolds as a continuous rhapsodic meditation. Musical ideas are repeatedly transformed, moving between darkness and light, and culminating in a serene, luminous conclusion. Together, these works form a thoughtful exploration of contemporary quartet writing, each offering space to reflect on our shared humanity and to find moments of hope and light in challenging times.

Track List:

Disc: 1

1. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores
2. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores I Pelagic Within
3. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores II Dream of the Xerces Blue
4. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores III Central Park Microbial
5. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores IV Invisible Eviction
6. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores V Crying, Together
7. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores VI Follow the Water
8. Michi Wiancko: To Unpathed Waters, Undreamed Shores VII Rise Up
9. Stephen Andrew Taylor: Chaconne/Labyrinth
10. Kati Agócs: 9 Imprimatur (String Quartet No. 2)
11. Kati Agócs: Recitative
12. Kati Agócs: I Ostinato
13. Kati Agócs: II Enraptured Troping
14. Kati Agócs: III Meditation — Crystal Chains
15. Kati Agócs: IV Wild Dance
16. Kati Agócs: V Quodlibet
17. Kati Agócs: Coda