UK's Niles Quartet boasts a string of accolades

By Rich Copley rcopley@herald-leader.com

The Niles Quartet has been a going concern at the University of Kentucky for years.

The ensemble, comprising graduate students and jointly funded by the university and Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra, is an auditioned group in which the names and faces have changed with the semesters. But there's never been a Niles Quartet quite like the ensemble of violinists Eun Young Chang and Jessica Tzou, violist Lauren Nelson and cellist Andrea Kleesattel.

The quartet got together just eight months ago and already has earned ­several honors:

■ Top prize at the University of ­Louisville's prestigious Macauley Chamber Music Competition.

■ An invitation for a three-week residency at the Banff Centre in Alberta, Canada.

■ A one-week residency with the Juilliard Quartet, including coaching sessions with the quartet and a performance at the Juilliard School in New York.

”This is what we had envisioned for the ensemble when we started it,“ says Dan Mason, head of the string department at UK.

The Niles Quartet — named in honor of UK's John Jacob Niles Center for American Music, which in turn honors the Kentucky composer and ”dean of American balladeers“ — is one of two graduate quartets co-funded by UK and the Philharmonic. The other is the Verdi Quartet.

Many Lexington-area classical music fans got a look at the Niles Quartet when it was spotlighted in the Lexington Philharmonic's MasterClassics concert in March. In addition to playing as a chamber ensemble, the women of the Niles also perform with the Philharmonic and UK Symphony Orchestra, the latter gig meaning they can also count a concert at Carnegie Hall and a performance with world-renowned cellist Lynn Harrell in their great year.

”It's the right amount of fun and hard work,“ says Tzou, who was raised in Lexington and earned a bachelor's degree at Stanford University in California before coming to UK. ”Quartet is important to us. We play together, work together and get along as a group really well.“

Kleesattel, who did her undergraduate work at the University of ­Cincinnati College-Conservatory of ­Music, says, ”We have a lot of respect for each other and each other's voices as ­musicians.“

The quartet also has ­excelled at giving recitals.

”We'd like them to give ­recitals each semester, but with all of their responsibilities, including the Philharmonic and the UK Symphony, that can be difficult,“ says the group's coach, Benjamin Karp, a cello professor at UK.

The Niles Quartet gave a fall recital and will give two performances in May.

”They molded together quickly and have done a lot of extra work,“ Karp says of the ensemble.

Says Tzou: ”We prioritize our rehearsals over sleep sometimes.“

Folks who come to the recital might notice some differences about way the Niles performs: Chang and Tzou trade off first and second violin parts, and unlike the traditional quartet set of violinists on one side, cellist and violist on the other, the Niles sits with the violinists at the front, emphasizing the balance of the ensemble.

”It's often said a quartet is a good violinist, a bad violinist, a failed violinist and a violin hater,“ Mason jokes. ”But these four really excel at their instruments and value the others.“

And they value performing.

”That's the highlight because that's when all the hard work comes together,“ says Nelson, who did her undergraduate work at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, N.Y.

The quartet will do its residencies at Juilliard and Banff early in the summer, then it will split up for a couple of months before re-forming in the fall.

After that, will they, like Niles Quartets past, split up at graduation? The players don't want to consider the prospect yet, and certainly many successful quartets have grown out of college experiences.

Karp says that Kleesattel has extended her master's degree work to a third year, primarily to stay with the quartet. The next year will have a big effect on the future, and their coach says it could be another good year.

Looking at experiences such as Juilliard and Banff, Karp says, ”These experiences set the stage for them to do a lot of things.“