Astraeus is proud to present another free, family-friendly concert at Pacifica’s Shelldance Orchid Gardens on Sunday, November 24th. Guests are encouraged to bring their family and friends for this fun event, which takes place inside of an active greenhouse! Light refreshments will be provided. Please note that seating for this event is on a first-come-first-serve basis, so please arrive 15-30 minutes early to reserve your seat.
Program:
Caroline Shaw: Plan & Elevation
Mendelssohn: String Quartet No. 2 in A Minor
Piazzolla: Four, For Tango
Astraeus’ mission is to bring exciting chamber works of the past and present to new audiences in the San Francisco Bay Area. Founded in 2018, the quartet is comprised of violinists Mia Nardi-Huffman and Samuel Nelson, violist Daphne Gooch, and cellist Jorge Maresch. The players have spent the last decade as colleagues and friends, performing chamber music together in a wide variety of settings, including their alma mater: the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.
Astraeus is passionate about performing in unconventional spaces, which have included decommissioned cotton mills, art deco-themed bars, greenhouses, and more. As affiliated artists of InterMusic SF, Astraeus performed at SF Music Day 2019 at the War Memorial Veterans Building. Most recently, the quartet launched its annual Commissioning Initiative, where they seek to sponsor underrepresented composers in classical music. For 2020, they will commission a new work from an LGBTQ+-identifying composer to be workshopped with the quartet in the spring and premiered in June for Pride Month. Astraeus looks forward to a continuing collaboration with the Shelldance Orchid Gardens in Pacifica CA, where they offer donation-based concerts inside of an active greenhouse, and the Astraeus Salon Series in San Francisco, where they perform works in an intimate setting along with food and wine.
The members of Astraeus hold degrees from San Francisco Conservatory of Music in the Bachelors and Masters Degree tiers, as well as the Manhattan School of Music and San Francisco’s Academy Orchestra. They have had the privilege of being coached by current or former members of the Concord, Ives, Kronos, and Telegraph String Quartets.