Finding the emotion in music helps Quartetto Indaco get all fired up

Classical, folk and pop music will all be in the programme when Quartetto Indaco play in the Galway Museum on Tuesday next, March 1.

The Italian based string quartet is made up of Eleonora Matsuno (violin), Jamiang Santi (violin), Andrei Harabagiu (viola) and Headford native Naomi Berrill (cello).

Naomi, who currently lives in Florence, takes some time out from a hectic schedule to talk about life as a freelance cellist, and the challenges involved in forming a string quartet.

“It’s very hard to get four people who get along together humanly, never mind being able to play at the same level,” she says about Quartetto Indaco, which was formed in 2007. “For years they were trying out different people and I met them when they were all about 23, 24.”

The meeting happened by chance.

“There was chamber music course and a cellist dropped out at the last minute,” Naomi continues. “A teacher of mine said ‘would you mind going on this course?’. On that course I met these guys. A week later they called me and said ‘we know you live in Florence and we live in Milan, but if you’d be interested in playing in a quartet and going for it as a career with us, we’d like to have a go’.”

The quartet involves an intense workload, Naomi explains. 

“It’s a big dedication; it’s like 10 days to three weeks of every month, together. They’re either at my house or I’m at their house, we rehearse 10 hours a day, eat together, sleep in the same house.”Surely a trained quartet can come to a concert, read the sheet music and play? Not so, says Naomi, who goes on give the reasons why it’s such an intense process.

“Anyone can just turn up and read as classical musicians,” she says. “But if you want to be a specific group who are known for playing together, you have to do something very special with it. When we study the music we have to get an image or an idea and agree on it. Then we work on the music to have this emotion or atmosphere. That adds an extra element to it.”

For more, read this week's Connacht Tribune.