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<title>String Quartet(s)</title>

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<p><i><b>String Quartet(s)</b></i> (2000–2023) is a digital four-channel <a href="Surround_sound" title="Surround sound">surround-sound</a> composition by Luxembourg-Australian composer <a href="Georges_Lentz" title="Georges Lentz">Georges Lentz</a>. It is over 43 hours long and plays constantly, day and night, in its permanent <a href="Sound_art" title="Sound art">sound installation</a> setting, the <a href="Cobar_Sound_Chapel" title="Cobar Sound Chapel">Cobar Sound Chapel</a> in remote <a href="Outback" title="Outback">Outback</a> <a href="New_South_Wales" title="New South Wales">New South Wales</a>, Australia.

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<p>CatherineGIDE-(1923-2013).jpg

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Background">Background</h2></div>

<p>The composer started writing string quartet fragments from the early 2000s over many years. This music was then developed during extensive recording sessions between 2008 and 2020 in collaboration with the Sydney-based <a href="String_quartet" title="String quartet">string quartet</a> <a href="The_Noise_(string_quartet)" title="The Noise (string quartet)">The Noise</a>. The recordings included both <a href="Musical_notation" title="Musical notation">notated music</a> and free and guided <a href="Improvisation_(music)" class="mw-redirect" title="Improvisation (music)">improvisation</a>, in both acoustic sound and with <a href="Distortion_(music)" title="Distortion (music)">feedback</a> pedals.<sup id="cite_ref-auto2_1-0" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto2-1"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>1<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Structure">Structure</h2></div>

<p><i>String Quartet(s)</i> is structured around predominantly sparse musical textures with many thousands of tiny musical dots (delicate short notes) that suggest "a starry night sky"<sup id="cite_ref-auto_2-0" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto-2"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>2<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup> (Lentz) and form the context for some hugely dramatic, complex musical clusters which emerge from and are embedded in this meditative backdrop.

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Techniques,_themes_and_influences">Techniques, themes and influences</h2></div>

<p>Over its vast duration the music develops and varies a number of musical <a href="Trope_(music)" title="Trope (music)">tropes</a>, such as a star-like glitter, bird-like and insect-like sounds, musical <a href="Unison" title="Unison">unisons</a>, quasi-tonal <a href="Chorale" title="Chorale">chorales</a>, digital <a href="Glitch_art" title="Glitch art">glitches</a> and <a href="Drone_(music)" class="mw-redirect" title="Drone (music)">drones</a>, electronic <a href="Distortion_(music)" title="Distortion (music)">distortions</a> of the acoustic sound, modernist <a href="Avant-garde" title="Avant-garde">avant-garde</a> gestures, <a href="Noise_music" title="Noise music">noise music</a>, multi-layered as well as very sparse textures, industrial as well as serene sounds, long haunting <a href="Solo_(music)" title="Solo (music)">solo</a> passages for the individual instruments, <a href="Techno_music" class="mw-redirect" title="Techno music">techno</a>-like beats, layered spoken text, hiss, cuts, loops etc... - all of which is punctuated again and again by periods of silence. The music constantly varies or modifies these musical tropes, without ever repeating them in an identical way.

</p><p>The overall effect is of a giant musical meditation which pulses, shimmers, glitters and fluctuates between mainly sparse time spans and sporadic clusters of dense musical activity, and which connects the listener to the vastness of the land, nature and sky of its remote Outback environment, as well as to the vast sparseness of boundless outer space.

</p><p><i>String Quartet(s)</i> is influenced by Lentz's reading of the epic poem <a href="Jerusalem%3A_The_Emanation_of_the_Giant_Albion" title="Jerusalem: The Emanation of the Giant Albion">Jerusalem: The Emanation of the Giant Albion</a> by <a href="William_Blake" title="William Blake">William Blake</a> (a quote from the poem can be found inscribed in the Cobar Sound Chapel's north-eastern wall) -

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</style><blockquote class="templatequote"><div class="poem">

<p><i>There is a Void, outside of Existence,</i> <br>

<i>Which if enter'd into</i><br>

<i>Englobes itself & becomes a Womb</i>

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<p>Some of the more active sections of the composition have an almost "<a href="Apocalypse" title="Apocalypse">apocalyptic</a>" slant to them, in keeping with Blake's <i>Jerusalem</i>, and the composer has written about trying to "render the music of Blake's poem". He also speaks about the work being akin to "a vast canvas filled with audio graffiti".<sup id="cite_ref-auto_2-1" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto-2"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>2<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

</p><p>The number 4 is an overarching feature of <i>String Quartet(s)</i>, as it is of the Cobar Sound Chapel architecture by renowned architect <a href="Glenn_Murcutt" title="Glenn Murcutt">Glenn Murcutt</a> which houses the composition. The <a href="Rhythm" title="Rhythm">rhythmical</a> proportions of 1/4/16 (or <a href="Whole_note" title="Whole note">semibreves</a>, <a href="Quarter_note" title="Quarter note">crotchets</a> and <a href="Sixteenth_note" title="Sixteenth note">semiquavers</a> in musical terms) is central to the music. <i>String Quartet(s)</i> is heard through four loudspeakers, which themselves often feature four musical lines each, or even four superimposed quartets. Thus the music, to the listener sitting on the Sound Chapel's central concrete plinth, consists of anything from silence or a single musical line to quartets within quartets within quartets.<sup id="cite_ref-auto1_3-0" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto1-3"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>3<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

</p><p>According to Lentz, the process of recording itself became one of the central concerns of the composition and anything from high-end professional equipment to a tinny smartphone was used. Very different acoustics and distances to the microphone were also explored and thus dry close-up sounds and highly resonant music are sometimes heard over the top of each other, giving the impression of "chambers within chambers" (according to British musicologist Tim Rutherford-Johnson in CD booklet)<sup id="cite_ref-auto1_3-1" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto1-3"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>3<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup> or different perspectives at the same time.

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Influence_of_AI">Influence of AI</h2></div>

<p>The composer speaks of experimenting with “simple” <a href="Artificial_intelligence" title="Artificial intelligence">AI</a> tools in minor parts of the composition. More generally, he writes about “especially in the visual arts, (having) been impressed with some AI-generated material that I sensed was actually starting to produce results which I felt humans had not achieved in quite the same way. This led me to imagine an awe-inspiring musical AI that might be truly creative, and I found myself musing about what such an AI might sound like - in other words, I found myself imitating AI, rather than it imitating me!” Lentz writes about this approach turning “into one of the overarching drivers behind the creation of <i>String Quartet(s)</i>.”<sup id="cite_ref-auto1_3-2" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto1-3"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>3<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

</p><p>In June 2025, and audio-only conversation between Lentz and <a href="ChatGPT-4" class="mw-redirect" title="ChatGPT-4">ChatGPT-4</a> about music and AI, recorded the previous month in the remoteness of the Australian Outback, was released on <a href="YouTube" title="YouTube">YouTube</a>. It includes music from <i>String Quartet(s)</i> and talks about it amongst other topics.<sup id="cite_ref-4" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-4"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>4<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Indigenous_inspiration_and_collaboration">Indigenous inspiration and collaboration</h2></div>

<p>Lentz's love of <a href="Australian_Aboriginal_art" class="mw-redirect" title="Australian Aboriginal art">Australian Aboriginal art</a>, especially the work of <a href="Kathleen_Petyarre" title="Kathleen Petyarre">Kathleen Petyarre</a> and within her work one painting in particular with innumerable tiny dots, is also a major inspiration behind <i>String Quartet(s)</i>, as it is behind much of the composer's music. A four-part glass artwork in the Cobar Sound Chapel's blue corner windows by local Indigenous artist Sharron Ohlsen features winding vertical dots which, according to the composer, are also “in dialogue with” the starry dots found in the sound art.<sup id="cite_ref-auto2_1-1" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-auto2-1"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>1<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="Recording">Recording</h2></div>

<p>A stereo version of part of the music was released on the <a href="KAIROS_(record_label)" class="mw-redirect" title="KAIROS (record label)">KAIROS</a> label in late 2024.<sup id="cite_ref-5" class="reference"><a href="#cite_note-5"><span class="cite-bracket">[</span>5<span class="cite-bracket">]</span></a></sup>

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="References">References</h2></div>

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<li id="cite_note-auto2-1"><span class="mw-cite-backlink">^ <a href="#cite_ref-auto2_1-0"><sup><i><b>a</b></i></sup></a> <a href="#cite_ref-auto2_1-1"><sup><i><b>b</b></i></sup></a></span> <span class="reference-text"><a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="https://www.cobarsoundchapel.com/the-music.html">[1]</a> Cobar Sound Chapel - About the music"</span>

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<li id="cite_note-auto-2"><span class="mw-cite-backlink">^ <a href="#cite_ref-auto_2-0"><sup><i><b>a</b></i></sup></a> <a href="#cite_ref-auto_2-1"><sup><i><b>b</b></i></sup></a></span> <span class="reference-text"><a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="http://www.georgeslentz.com/stringquartets.html">[2]</a> Georges Lentz personal website - About "String Quartet(s)"</span>

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<li id="cite_note-auto1-3"><span class="mw-cite-backlink">^ <a href="#cite_ref-auto1_3-0"><sup><i><b>a</b></i></sup></a> <a href="#cite_ref-auto1_3-1"><sup><i><b>b</b></i></sup></a> <a href="#cite_ref-auto1_3-2"><sup><i><b>c</b></i></sup></a></span> <span class="reference-text"><a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="https://www.kairos-music.com/cds/0022046kai">[3]</a> KAIROS Records - from "String Quartet(s)"</span>

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<li id="cite_note-4"><span class="mw-cite-backlink"><b><a href="#cite_ref-4">^</a></b></span> <span class="reference-text"> <a rel="nofollow" class="external free" href="https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_lskRK7_kTE&t=503s&pp=ygUNbGVudHogY2hhdGdwdA%3D%3D">https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=_lskRK7_kTE&t=503s&pp=ygUNbGVudHogY2hhdGdwdA%3D%3D</a></span>

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<li id="cite_note-5"><span class="mw-cite-backlink"><b><a href="#cite_ref-5">^</a></b></span> <span class="reference-text"><a rel="nofollow" class="external autonumber" href="https://www.kairos-music.com/cds/0022046kai">[4]</a> KAIROS Records - from "String Quartet(s)" </span>

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<div class="mw-heading mw-heading2"><h2 id="External_links">External links</h2></div>

<p>[<a rel="nofollow" class="external free" href="https://kairos-music.com/products/recording/0022046kai">https://kairos-music.com/products/recording/0022046kai</a> KAIROS Records - Lentz: from “String Quartet(s)

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<ul><li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="https://www.cobarsoundchapel.com/the-music.html">Cobar Sound Chapel - The music</a></li>

<li><a rel="nofollow" class="external text" href="http://www.georgeslentz.com/stringquartets.html">Georges Lentz - composer</a></li></ul></div><div><div class="zim-footer">

This article is issued from <a class="external text" title="Last edited on 2025-06-10" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/?title=String_Quartet(s)&oldid=1294819223">Wikipedia</a>. The text is available under <a class="external text" href="https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/deed.en">Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0</a> unless otherwise noted. Additional terms may apply for the media files.

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