It was kind of like an arranged marriage, and it seemed to work out pretty well.

And so here we are today, ten years later, ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ Were incredibly thrilled to receive the Avery Fisher Career Grant.

And the way we found out was I got this phone call from a number that my phone didn't recognize and that I didn't recognize either.

And usually when there's no caller ID, usually I just kind of let it go to voicemail.

But for some reason, I decided to pick up this call and then suddenly I was in the middle of this news.

You've been awarded... Vianos been awarded the Avery Fisher Career Grant for 2025.

And I remember being so dumbfounded, and I think I just sat there for about 15 seconds in complete silence and and like and then I think I heard a hello or something like that, and I managed to squeak out, Oh, my goodness, we're so thrilled.

I can't wait to share this with everybody.

So how we came about with the name Viano is we had a very long list of potential names.

There's I think it's about 80 different names.

And they were all either vetoed, or you know, somebody had an issue.

But I remember it was the night before we had to submit a name for our first international competition in Osaka.

The name Viano came to me.

I was like, Hey, that sounds pretty.

That sounds pretty good.

I like the sound of that.

And then and then I started thinking, Hey, it's kind of like piano, but what if it was four instruments playing as one instrument that we would call a Viano?

And so then I submitted this in our little group group chat and everyone gave it a thumbs up and we were good to go.

The quartet was formed almost ten years ago in 2015 at the Colburn Conservatory in Los Angeles.

And how it came about was that all incoming freshmen have to do a five minute audition in front of the chamber music teachers, and it's 5 minutes of unaccompanied Bach.

And based on that audition, our coaches put us together.

It was kind of like an arranged marriage, and it seemed to work out pretty well.

And so here we are today, ten years later.

The first work on our program for tomorrow evening is the first movement of Alistair Coleman's “Moonshot.

{ Alistair told us that his inspiration for this piece was by an artwork by On Kawara, which was a date painting, and On Kawara on a piece of canvas, would just write the date on for every day and had a specific set of requirements.

And if he didn't achieve those, then the painting would be thrown away that day.

And so this triptych followed the events of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

We met Alistair a few years ago and we we instantly became friends.

We fell in love with his music and he's he's about our age.

He was born in 1998.

And so it's pretty cool to to work with him and talk about his music.

And we're so excited to share the launch movement.

You'll hear, I think, that whine of the engines right at the beginning of the space shuttle about to launch and then it just erupts into this absolutely fantastic, really fun, exciting work ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ And after that, we have the slow movement of Haydn's final string quartet.

He wrote part of a string quartet after Opus 77, number two.

But his last full quartet is this one out of 68 string quartets that Haydn Haydn put out into the world.

In the slow movement, Haydn creates a sound that is incredibly sincere and is incredibly deep.

But at the same time very approachable.

And he begins with just a violin and a cello, and it's a simple tune and bass line.

And then the piece very slowly develops and it almost evokes the image of a pleasant walk in the meadow or the park with a friend or a close family member or something like that.

Haydn is the father of the string quartet.

We wouldn't have any of these other works.

We wouldn't be here right now if it weren't for him.

So we really wanted to represent him somewhere.

And I think it's one of the most beautiful classical works out there.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ And to end, you have the last movement of Mendelssohn's Final String Quartet as well.

His Opus 8, which is one of his most fiery string quartets.

He wrote it after I believe his sister died, and he was in a state of incredible grief.

The Mendelssohn was actually the first piece we played together as a quartet.

That was the one that brought us together.

They're all pieces that we fell in love with at first play through, and we really wanted to demonstrate both a sampling of all the works that we love, everything we love about playing chamber music.

♪♪ So ever since we've graduated, you know, we've been touring a lot.

And often when we go to different cities, the chamber music societies are able to organize a masterclass with the universities in those cities.

Being a member of a string quartet, we all teach each other all the time.

I think one of the things that's really wonderful about having the opportunity to teach other people is both being able to teach people who are not these three.

And also I think we learn so much when we teach students.

And of course it's always incredible when something lands and just makes everything so much better.

That's always a really satisfying part.

So one of our dreams.

Ever since we got together as a quartet, we really wanted to commission a concerto for string quartet and orchestra.

We think that would be a really exciting project and this grant is very meaningful to us because it's a huge step toward making something like that happen and we're all very excited for what possibilities that could bring.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ [Applause] Weve always been very interested in music education and very passionate about it.

The first time we had an experience with it was actually as a result of winning the Banff competition.

After we won, one of the prizes was a residency, the Peak Fellowship residency at the Southern Methodist University's Meadows School of the Arts.