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I\u2019m at a soundcheck for the Kronos Quartet in the recently re-opened Beacon Hall in Bristol. The quartet aren\u2019t actually playing their instruments, but tapping water bottles with soft xylophone sticks. Leader David Harrington has a black bottle, cellist Paul Wiancko a pink one, viola player Hank Dutt a blue one and whatever second violinist John Sherba is hitting… I can\u2019t see what, because it\u2019s hidden by his iPad. <\/p>
It\u2019s about getting the bottles at the right angles and hitting them in the most sonorous place. The piece is called \u2018Water\u2019, by Seattle-based composer and climate-change activist Gabriella Smith. It\u2019s a movement from Keep Going<\/em>, written for the Kronos\u2019s 50th anniversary, and begins with a recording of trickling water followed by the tapping water bottles, the sound of rice inside a violin and the rattling of seeds in packets.\u00a0<\/p> Kronos\u2019s Bristol concert includes music by composers from the US, Iceland, Benin and Serbia, and traditional music from Iran. Needless to say, it\u2019s like no other string quartet<\/a><\/strong> concert and references different styles and genres of music from all over the world. But that\u2019s how the Kronos have revolutionised what we think of as a string quartet. They\u2019ve commissioned over 1,100 pieces and sold over 4 million recordings.<\/p>