For those latter, there's no way around it. Their minds are reaching out for the new, never satisfied with what they've got. In that way, they embrace Schuppanzigh and what he did, but like Bill Clinton working a crowd, they constantly move on, shaking more hands, exchanging more greetings. And it's always exciting to do something new that no one's heard before. To present something totally fresh to an audience is liberating.
String quartets can form long-term relationships with composers.
The Cassatt String Quartet , for example, has worked with the same composers over two decades, watching and even helping their writing evolve. Others, like the Colorado String Quartet , have long-term relationships with presenters, agreeing to play a new piece on a series every two years or so. What the composers get back, simply, is the immediacy, intimacy and expressive possibilities of the string quartet. The variability and depth of this canvas have never failed the imagination. Just the same way, painting will never die either.