Reporter Volume 25, No.24 April 14, 1994

Amherst Saxophone Quartet begins two-year residency
By PATRICIA DONOVAN
News Bureau Staff
The Amherst Saxophone Quartet (ASQ), one of the nation's most
celebrated and critically applauded musical ensembles, has begun a
two-year residency in the UB Department of Music.
The residency agreement calls for the group to present an annual
concert series, plus other campus performances; offer master's classes
and workshops through the UB Music Department; perform works by the UB
composition faculty; assist student musicians in establishing
professional ensembles, and represent UB through appearances at
conferences of musicians and music educators.
The ASQ has performed in UB's Slee Concert Hall several times during
its 1993-94 local concert season, but Kerry Grant, dean of arts and
letters at UB, says that the bulk of the quartet's work with the
university will take place during the 1994-95 and 1995-96 academic
years.
The quartetQSalvadore Andolina, Russ Carere, Stephen Rosenthal and
Harry FackelmanQis celebrating its 16th performance season and is one
of the most active saxophone quartets in the world. Based in Amherst,
N.Y., the group tours the United States annually and in 1993 added
Japan to its list of performance venues.
ASQ has made appearances in Carnegie Hall, the Kennedy Center and
Lincoln Center, and has been broadcast on National Public Radio, Voice
of America and the Tonight Show on NBC. It will perform with the
Cleveland String Quartet during the 1995-96 season.
Members of the quartet consider the group a laboratory for the
exploration of new music. Many of the hundreds of compositions written
for the ASQ are now in the repertoires of quartets across the country.
The group, which recently received commissioning grants from Chamber
Music America and the National Endowment for the Arts, was awarded
First Prize for Adventuresome Programming by Chamber Music
America/American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP).
 The ensemble has recorded six albums, including two recordings of new
American music; an all-Bach album; an all-Eubie Blake disc; a
collaboration with Lukas Foss, and, most recently, a jazz recording.
The group will present its last UB performance of the season at 8 p.m.
on Monday, May 2, in Slee Concert Hall. Titled "Sax, Harp & Flute,"
the program will feature the quartet, harpist Beth Ann Breneman and
flutist Rhonda Schwartz in a program by Bach, Mozart and contemporary
composers I. Kramer and A. Sigel.
Andolina, Rosenthal and Fackelman are alumni of the UB Music
Department. Carere studied music at the State University of New York
College at Fredonia.
The Amherst Saxophone Quartet receives funding from the National
Endowment for the Arts, New York State Council on the Arts, the County
of Erie, the City of Buffalo and from foundation and corporation
grants and individual donors.