Meet the Coaches

The quartet is working with two coaches for this concert set: David Martin and Cindy Petty

Composer David Martin whose quartet we will premiere on the 16th. One of the joys of working with David is that he knows exactly what he wants to hear and he’s able to communicate those ideas. This is essential when playing new music. At first, we were having a hard time learning his piece, not because it was incredibly difficult, but because we’d never played anything by Martin! If you hand us a Haydn, Beethoven, or Shostakovich we would instinctively understand the style. Not so much with Martin. We didn't know his style until after our coaching with him. His music is a great blend of Bach's mathematical style and Prokofiev's lyricism (if you can get your head around that idea). We’re really looking forward to the performance.

Cindy Petty is our music mom. Cindy is the person who got Highstrung started about 8 years ago and for that we are so grateful! We are working with her on the Haydn, Borodin, and Beethoven. She is a fantastic coach who gives us quite a workout. I remember back when we first started to work with Cindy, our coachings were at the ungodly hour of 6a.m. She would work with us until around 7:45 then we would go home completely spent from our exertions. That same night we would work with Cindy at youth orchestra from 6-9 p.m. and she would have the same amount of energy and passion that she had had that morning! She’s amazing. Beyond that, she is also a remarkable chamber music coach. Her knowledge and experience helps us portray the character of the music and not merely play the notes (although she's pretty good at making us learn the notes too. =)

Here is about a minute of video caught from our “Coach's Cam” during a few of our sessions.

I know a lot of you are upset right now because you didn't hear us really play anything or you didn't feel it was long enough! Well, I feel terrible about that! Sorry! I guess you'll just have to come to a concert.

- The Cellist