Turtle Island Quartet

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"This unique, jazzy four piece continues to entertain with its distinctive brand of tight, impressive bow-etry in motion."

— Billboard Magazine

“…intellectually engaging, technically dazzling and emotionally rich…”

— The Birmingham News

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  • Since its inception in 1985, the Turtle Island Quartet has been a singular force in the creation of bold, new trends in chamber music for strings. Winner of the 2006 and 2008 Grammy Awards for Best Classical Crossover Album, Turtle Island fuses the classical quartet esthetic with contemporary American musical styles, and by devising a performance practice that honors both, the state of the art has inevitably been redefined. Cellist nonpareil Yo-Yo Ma has proclaimed TIQ to be “a unified voice that truly breaks new ground – authentic and passionate – a reflection of some of the most creative music-making today.”

    The Quartet’s birth was the result of violinist David Balakrishnan’s brainstorming explorations and compositional vision while completing his master’s degree program at Antioch University West. The journey has taken Turtle Island through forays into folk, bluegrass, swing, be-bop, funk, R&B, new age, rock, hip-hop, as well as music of Latin America and India…a repertoire consisting of hundreds of ingenious arrangements and originals. It has included over a dozen recordings on labels such as Windham Hill, Chandos, Koch, Telarc and Azica, soundtracks for major motion pictures, TV and radio credits such as the Today Show, All Things Considered, Prairie Home Companion, and Morning Edition, feature articles in People and Newsweek magazines, and collaborations with famed artists such as trumpeter Terence Blanchard, clarinetist Paquito D’Rivera, vibraphonist Stefon Harris, guitar legends such as Leo Kottke and the Assad brothers, The Manhattan Transfer, pianists Billy Taylor, Kenny Barron, Cyrus Chestnut and Ramsey Lewis, singers Tierney Sutton and Nellie McKay, the Ying Quartet and the Parsons and Luna Negra Dance Companies.

    Another unique element of Turtle Island is their revival of venerable improvisational and compositional chamber traditions that have not been explored by string players for nearly 200 years. At the time of Haydn’s apocryphal creation of the string quartet form, musicians were more akin to today’s saxophonists and keyboard masters of the jazz and pop world, i.e., improvisers, composers, and arrangers. Each Turtle Island member is accomplished in these areas of expertise.

    As Turtle Island members continue to refine their skills through the development of repertory by some of today’s cutting edge composers, through performances and recordings with major symphonic ensembles, and through a determined educational commitment, the Turtle Island Quartet stakes its claim as the quintessential ‘New World’ string quartet of the 21st century. For a more detailed historical narrative, click here

  • PIAZZOLA + Turtle Island

    This program situates selected movements from Astor Piazzolla’s Las Cuatro Estaciones Porteñas within a broader exploration of contemporary string writing through original compositions by David Balakrishnan, founder and artistic director of Turtle Island Quartet. Heard in a string quartet arrangement, Piazzolla’s music functions not as crossover repertoire but as a pivotal 20th-century expansion of chamber idiom—one that integrates rhythmic propulsion, extended articulation, and popular vernacular into a rigorously constructed form. These movements serve as structural and stylistic reference points within a program otherwise devoted to Balakrishnan’s compositional voice.

    Balakrishnan’s works reflect a composer-performer perspective grounded in deep instrumental knowledge and an expanded conception of quartet texture. His writing treats the ensemble as a multi-layered system in which traditional contrapuntal roles coexist with groove-based ostinati, flexible harmonic frameworks, and moments of controlled improvisation. Within the Piazzolla selections, brief improvised passages are incorporated as structural elements rather than ornamentation, aligning with both Piazzolla’s own performance practice and Balakrishnan’s interest in permeability between composition and real-time creation.

    Together, these works articulate a continuum in the evolution of string quartet literature—one that challenges the fixed boundaries between classical form, popular rhythm, and improvisation. Designed for classical presenters, the program foregrounds Turtle Island Quartet not only as interpreters but as active contributors to the chamber canon, offering a compelling case for the string quartet as a living, adaptive medium shaped by composer-performers who write from within the instrument itself.

ISLAND PRAYERS

We are the first human beings in history to have so much of man’s culture and previous experience available for our study, and being free enough of the weight of traditional cultures to seek out a larger identity; the first members of a civilized society since the Neolithic to wish to look clearly into the eyes of the wild and see our self-hood, our family, there.

—Gary Snyder “Four Changes” Turtle Island, 1975

Thirty-five years ago, four American string players formed a quartet with the express purpose of melding the wide range of music performed in North America, both past and present. To honor the significant lineage of these musical traditions and the profound relationship between them, the quartet borrowed an “old/new name for the continent, based on many creation myths of the people who have been here for millennia.” “Turtle Island” is the origin story shared by many First Nation people of the Eastern Woodlands, where it is said that the entire continent of North America was built from soil placed on the back of a great Turtle. This myth has inspired a unifying bond between many tribes.

Since its inception, the Turtle Island Quartet has undergone many transformations. Just in the last year, they have begun transitioning from an ensemble that features a hybrid of arranged standards and new repertoire, such as the group’s recent Bird’s Eye View, to an original music ensemble. To commemorate their new identity, the quartet, resident composer and violinist David Balakrishnan with violinist Gabriel Terracciano, violist Benjamin von Gutzeit and cellist Naseem Alatrash, has taken on an ambitious, multi-composer commission. Island Prayers will celebrate the range of influences within the rich cultural spectrum of the continent “Turtle Island.” The group has identified four (4) venerable and accomplished composers with varying life experiences and musical foundations:

1. Six-time GRAMMY®-award winner, double Oscar® Nominee and EMMY® Nominee Terence Blanchard.
2. MacArthur Genius Fellow and Silk Road Ensemble Artistic Director Rhiannon Giddens.
3. New Music USA Composer-in-Residence and Joyce Award Winner Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate
4. GRAMMY®-award winning Turtle Island Quartet founder, composer in residence and violinist David Balakrishnan

Each composer will be creating ten (10) minute works for the quartet. This evening-length commission will premiere in Fall of 2023 at Meany Hall in Seattle and will feature the range of styles that this quartet alone is designed to interpret and perform. In addition to the quartet’s unique combination of jazz, American roots and new music, these works will also include some indigenous and folkloric styles that the quartet will be approaching for the first time.

CO-COMMISSIONERS

MEANY PERFORMING ARTS CENTER (Seattle, WA)

THE MUSIC HALL (Portsmouth, NH)

LINCOLN CENTER FOR THE PERFORMING ARTS (New York, NY)

EMORY UNIVERSITY (Atlanta, GA)

SAVANNAH MUSIC FESTIVAL (Savannah, GA)