Arts & Culture

With the revival of George Crumb's Black Angel, Kronos Quartet last Thursday at San Francisco's Yerba Buena arts center revisits its roots and creative inspiration, completing an almost 40-year cycle, which started in 1973, when Kronos founder, musical director and violist David Harrington heard the 1970 avant-garde piece. Harrington tells VOA Persian TV's Behnam Nateghi that the ensemble's entire experience is in keeping with that inspiration. Crumb's re-staging of Black Angels is bundled with a selection of socially aware historical mix-media chamber pieces by Ingram Marshal, Bob Ostertag and the Serbian composer Alexandra Vrebalov. The evening begins with the premiere of Iranian composer Sahba Aminikia's third quartet, A Threnody for Those Who Remain, which according to Sahba, was composed in honor of his departed father, and is accompanied by a soundtrack of Tehran, where he visited last year.