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ETHEL
Established in New York City in 1998, the string quartet ETHEL sets the contemporary concert standard: “indefatigable and eclectic” (The New York Times), “vital and brilliant” (The New Yorker). Composer performers—Ralph Farris (viola), Kip Jones (violin), Dorothy Lawson (cello), and Corin Lee (violin)—fuse uptown panache with downtown genre mashup. ETHEL has performed across the United States and worldwide; released 9 feature albums; guested on 40+ recordings; won a GRAMMY® with jazz legend Kurt Elling; and toured with Todd Rundgren & Joe Jackson. ETHEL champions the art and music of today, forging human connections across sound and style.
At the heart of ETHEL is a collaborative ethos — a quest for common creative expression, forged in listening and community. The quartet designs productions that inspire engagement, such as The River, featuring Taos Pueblo flutist Robert Mirabal, and Signature Sessions, a supercharged survey of the quartet’s 25 years of inspired music-making.
ETHEL has premiered over 250 works, many of them commissioned by the quartet; ETHEL members have themselves been commissioned by The Ringling Museum of Art, Brooklyn Academy of Music, Georgia Tech, and the NEA. The quartet regularly performs music by such celebrated composers as Julia Wolfe, Jerod Impichchaachaaha’ Tate, Jessie Montgomery, Andy Akiho, and Marcelo Zarvos. Other collaborators include Bang on a Can All-Stars, Vijay Iyer, Stewart Copeland, Raven Chacon, David Byrne, Annie-B Parson, Gina Gibney, Grant McDonald, Steve Cosson, and Annie Dorsen.
Recent and upcoming appearances include the Kennedy Center, Charleston Literary Festival, High Line Greenway Park, Dumbarton Oaks, and Taos Chamber Music Group. The 2022/23 season also features a premiere at Brooklyn Public Library, of the fifth chapter of ETHEL’s HomeBaked project, a commissioning initiative showcasing emerging composers. This concert also features the premiere of a commission of the Cleveland Orchestra’s Daniel R. Lewis Composer Fellow, flutist Allison Loggins-Hull.
ETHEL has been featured at TED Conferences; on ABC Radio Australia, SiriusXM, Conan O’Brien, John Schaefer’s New Sounds, Fred Child’s Performance Today, Randy Cohen’s Person Place Thing, NPR’s Weekend Edition; and on the soundtracks of Dan In Real Life and HBO’s Deadwood. From mid-2020 to early ‘22, ETHEL curated and produced Balcony Bar from Home, a virtual series hosted on The Metropolitan Museum’s Facebook page which has garnered nearly 2 million views.
ETHEL is Ensemble-in-Residence at Denison University, and Resident Ensemble at The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Petrie Court Café.
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Dorothy Lawson: ETHEL's String Theory For Quartets
by Lawrence Peryer
Today, the Spotlight shines On legendary cellist Dorothy Lawson.Dorothy and the group ETHEL have spent years breaking down walls between classical, jazz, rock and world music.On March 13, 2025, at New York City's Carnegie Hall, Dorothy teams up with bass legend Ron Carter to reimagine his landmark Kronos Quartet recording from 40 years ago, featuring arrangements of music by Thelonious Monk.Dorothy shares how ETHEL has evolved through four generations of musicians, their unique residency ...
Continue ReadingETHEL: Light
by John Kelman
These days musicians raised in compartmentalized traditions can find themselves challenged by the homogeneous blending of diverse musical interests. Not so with Ethel, a young string quartet that may be traditional in configuration, but brings together a wealth of influences--not because it's fashionable, but because it's the only thing that makes sense. Light, the followup to Ethel's remarkable 2003 eponymous debut, continues to explore the nexus of composed music and improvisation with a rawness not normally found in contemporary classical ...
Continue ReadingETHEL: Ethel
by John Kelman
While it is an unavoidable fact that the Kronos Quartet has set the standard for contemporary string quartets interpreting an almost exclusively contemporary repertoire, the fact of the matter is that they come from a classical background, and no matter how far they attempt to stray from it, they can't escape it. Their attempts to interpret the music of Thelonious Monk and Bill Evans, for example, did nothing more than highlight their more literal interpretations. Not so with Ethel, whose ...
Continue ReadingAcclaimed String Quartet ETHEL And Legendary Bassist Ron Carter Present Reflections On Monk And Bach, Zankel Hall At Carnegie Hall, March 13, 2025
Source:
AMT Public Relations
World premiere performance of MONK SUITE — compositions and arrangements for string quartet and bass featuring the music of Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington and J. S. Bach String quartet ETHEL ’s Carnegie Hall debut The “avatar of ‘post-classical’ music—the virtuosic string quartet ETHEL (The New Yorker)” and legendary bassist Ron Carter join forces for an unforgettable classical-jazz mashup performance at Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall on Thursday, March 13, 2025, at 7:30 p.m.Centered on the music from Monk Suite: Kronos ...
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Ethel Ennis (1932-2019)
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
Ethel Ennis, a female jazz-pop singer with an exceptional vocal range and a warm, seductive style that made listeners feel as if they just kicked off their shoes and extended their legs on a soft sofa, died on February 17. She was 86. There was a hint of Sarah Vaughan in Ennis's voice, but instead of deploying Vaughan's coy phrasing at the end of lyric lines, Ennis played it straight, releasing a warm, elegant vibrato. Starting in 1955, her albums ...
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Ethel Ennis Sings for Losers
Source:
JazzWax by Marc Myers
When the 10-inch pop vinyl album expanded to 12 inches in the mid-1950s, the glory days of the vocalist began and lasted until roughly 1965. There were the A-list recording artists such as Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald, Peggy Lee, Billie Holiday, Margaret Whiting, Sarah Vaughan, Kay Starr, Dinah Washington, June Christy and many others who had started their careers during the big band era. But there also were dozens of other lesser known singers who had come ...
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Jazz Musician of the Day: Ethel Waters
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Ethel Waters' birthday today!
Vocalist and actress Ethel Waters was a key figure in the development of African American culture between the two World Wars. She broke barrier after barrier, becoming the first black woman heard on the radio, the first black singer to perform on television, the first African American to perform in an integrated cast on Broadway, and the first black woman to perform in a lead dramatic role on Broadway... Read more. ...
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Jazz at Lincoln Center Presents Ethel Waters: Blues, Broadway and Jazz
Source:
Buzzword PR
Jazz at Lincoln Center will produce Ethel Waters: Blues, Broadway, and Jazz as part of the second season of the Jazz & Popular Song series. Hosted by singer-pianist Michael Feinstein, who also serves as Director for the series, this concert celebrates the decades-spanning career of entertainer Ethel Waters. Waters was a singular performer who conquered Broadway, nightclubs, movies, television and radio. At one time, she was the highest-paid entertainer on Broadway. She was a major player in the introduction of ...
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Jazz Musician of the Day: Ethel Waters
Source:
Michael Ricci
All About Jazz is celebrating Ethel Waters' birthday today!
JAZZ MUSICIAN OF THE DAY Ethel Waters
Ethel Waters - vocalist (1896 - 1977) Vocalist and actress Ethel Waters was a key figure in the development of African American culture between the two World Wars. She broke barrier after barrier... more
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Ethel's 2nd Annual Winter Solstice Concert
Source:
AMT Public Relations
WHAT: 2ND Annual IN THE HOUSE OF ETHEL: SOLSTICE WHEN: Friday, December 21st @ 12:30pm & 7:00pm WHERE: World Financial Center Winter Garden 220 Vesey Street. Train E to World Trade Center HOW: FREE. For more info, contact 212.945.0505 AMERICA'S FAVORITE STRING BAND, ETHEL, RETURNS TO THE WORLD FINANCIAL CENTER FOR ITS 2ND ANNUAL WINTER SOLSTICE CELEBRATION Featuring Six World Premieres and Four Special Guest Pianists New York City--- ETHEL, the nation's ...
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Vijay Iyer with special guest ETHEL Merkin Concert Hall at Kaufman Center Thursday, January 27, at 8 PM
Source:
All About Jazz
Gospel great Ethel Elliott dead at 76
Source:
All About Jazz
CHAPEL HILL -- Ethel Elliott, half of The Branchettes gospel singing duo, has died at the age of 76, the N.C. Arts Council said Monday. Elliott suffered a stroke during an appearance Nov. 29 and died Wednesday at UNC Hospitals in Chapel Hill, council spokesman Joe Newberry said.
Elliott was born near Benson in rural Johnston County and grew up in a family and church that encouraged spiritual music.
The Branchettes were formed by chance in the mid-1960s. Elliott, Lena ...
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ETHEL
Location: New York City
Instrument: Band / ensemble / orchestra
Publicist: AMT Public Relations
