Symphony for String Quartet and Forest

I wonder about the trees
Why do we wish to bear
Forever the noise of these
More than another noise
So close to our dwelling place?

The Sound of Trees - Robert Frost

Supported by the National Forest, Project String Quartet are working with schools in the National Forest to educate children about nature, classical music and their connection with the String Quartet; bringing these themes together in a group performance of a newly written piece titled Symphony for String Quartet and Forest.

The exciting project takes place across Derbyshire, Leicestershire and Staffordshire; working with 5 schools and over 500 students in the National Forest to understand more about nature, trees and wood that surrounds their local area, and its connection to the instruments of the string quartet and classical music.

PSQ is working alongside the Kyan Quartet to present a range of educational presentation concerts and performance workshops, culminating in an outdoor public performance in the National Forest itself; commissioning young composer Jacob Fitzgerald to create a work performed by string quartet and the students on found objects from the forest such as twigs, branches, roots and leaves.

Creating new music, growing ideas

Each school involved in the project will take part in the final outdoor performance of Jacob Fitzgerald’s new work, Symphony for String Quartet and Forest. The music has moments in which all 180 children will perform together to recite poetry and interact with the natural sounds of the forest to create a beautiful soundscape together.

There are also 6 solo sections throughout the music, each assigned to groups of 20-30 children from each school. Last week Graham Oppenheimer and the Kyan quartet visited the children to perform, present musical education sessions and to deliver performance workshops in which each group worked on their solo section, adding their own ideas and impressions into the music to create something collaborative and original.

The Kyan Quartet at Broom Leys Primary School

Connecting with nature through music

Following PSQ’s visits to the 5 schools, the Kyan Quartet and members of school staff have been to the site of Timber Festival in the centre of the National Forest to finalise plans for the outdoor performance on the 1 July 2022.

The final performance will be attended by family and other members of the schools, situated in a beautiful space surrounded by forest and panoramas of the National Forest. Each school group’s solo sections have been developed to engage with the natural surroundings of the performance to involve branches, leaves, roots and the trees themselves - resulting in a piece of music that connects the sounds of the string quartets with the very materials they originated from.

Members of the Kyan and Graham on the site visit!

Taking Classical to its Roots

Each performance workshop was paired with a performance and music education session for over 500 students. These highly interactive sessions introduced a wealth of pieces and composers to the children such as Beethoven, Mozart and Haydn; not only performing them, but breaking down the roles of the quartet and taking a closer look at the different elements of music.

The sessions also traced seminal works of the String Quartet repertoire back to their inspirations in nature, looking at pieces like Haydn’s Op.33 (known as “The Bird”) to listen to how Classical music reflects sounds of the natural world. PSQ worked with the children to explore the origins of the string quartet itself, highlighting its dependence on forests to create the instruments and the processes behind building them. Each school was highly involved in the session and took part in all of the interactive elements with enthusiasm and excitement - the groups are now working with their teachers to finalise their solos, ready for the outdoor performance in July.