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Doors 2:30 p.m.; Event 3 p.m.
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THE EXPERIENCE

Join Chamber Music Northwest for a special screening of the documentary Four Rational People, featuring Emerson String Quartet member and cellist Paul Watkins, who will be in attendance and take part in a post-film discussion with Soovin Kim, Co-Artistic Director of Chamber Music Northwest. Directed by Tristan Cook, Four Rational People explores the bittersweet ending of the Emerson String Quartet as they embark on their final season of a fifty-year history that includes nine Grammy awards and thousands of concerts. 

ON SCREEN: Four Rational People

2025. Directed by Tristan Cook. Runtime: 104 minutes. 
Goethe once said that a string quartet is like “a conversation between Four Rational People,”  and for the members of the Emerson String Quartet, that conversation is coming to a bittersweet ending as they embark on their final season of a fifty-year history that includes nine Grammy awards and thousands of concerts.

Interweaving vivid memories of the Emerson Quartet’s past with delicate observations of life on the road in the weeks and days before disbanding, Four Rational People explores the group’s difficult decision to walk away from the things that they cherish most in life: the music they play and the friends they hold dear. At once a frank examination of the tyranny of aging and a cri de cœur to pass the torch to a new generation of artists, Four Rational People culminates with one final Emerson Quartet performance for the ages, leaving all to ponder what happens to us after the final curtain.

ON STAGE: 

Paul Watkins (Emerson String Quartet member) – Acclaimed for his inspirational performances and eloquent musicianship, Paul Watkins enjoys a distinguished career as concerto soloist, chamber musician, and conductor. Born in 1970, he studied with William Pleeth, Melissa Phelps and Johannes Goritzki, and at the age of 20 was appointed Principal Cellist of the BBC Symphony Orchestra. During his solo career, he has collaborated with world-renowned conductors including Sakari Oramo, Gianandrea Noseda, Sir Mark Elder, Andris Nelsons, Sir Andrew Davis, and Sir Charles Mackerras. He performs regularly with all the major British orchestras and others further afield, including with the Norwegian Radio, Royal Flemish Philharmonic, Melbourne Symphony and Queensland Orchestras. He has also made eight concerto appearances at the BBC Proms, most recently with the BBC National Orchestra of Wales in the world premiere of the cello concerto composed for him by his brother, Huw Watkins, and premiered (and was the dedicatee of) Mark-Anthony Turnage’s cello concerto. Highlights of recent seasons include concerto appearances with the Hong Kong Philharmonic, Bournemouth Symphony, and the BBC Symphony under Semyon Bychkov, a tour with the European Union Youth Orchestra under the baton of Bernard Haitink, and his US concerto debut with the Colorado Symphony. A dedicated chamber musician, Watkins was a member of the Nash Ensemble from 1997 to 2013, and joined the Emerson String Quartet in May 2013. He is a regular guest artist at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York and Music@Menlo, and in 2014 he was appointed Artistic Director of the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival in Detroit. Watkins also maintains a busy career as a conductor and, since winning the 2002 Leeds Conducting Competition, has conducted all the major British orchestras. Further afield, he has conducted the Royal Flemish Philharmonic, Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Prague Symphony, Ensemble Orchestral de Paris, Tampere Philharmonic, Netherlands Radio Chamber Philharmonic and the Melbourne Symphony, Queensland and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestras. Paul Watkins is an exclusive recording artist with Chandos Records, and his recent releases include Britten’s Cello Symphony, the Delius, Elgar, Lutoslawski and Walton cello concertos, and discs of British and American music for cello and piano with Huw Watkins. His first recording as a conductor, of the Berg and Britten violin concertos with Daniel Hope, received a Grammy nomination.       

Soovin Kim (co-Artistic Director Chamber Music Northwest) – Soovin Kim enjoys a broad musical career, regularly performing Bach sonatas and Paganini caprices for solo violin, sonatas for violin and piano ranging from Beethoven to Ives, Mozart and Haydn concertos and symphonies as a conductor, and new world-premiere works almost every season. When he was 20 years old, Kim received first prize at the Paganini International Violin Competition. He immersed himself in the string quartet literature for 20 years as the first violinist of the Johannes Quartet. Among his many commercial recordings are his “thrillingly triumphant” (Classic FM Magazine) disc of Paganini’s demanding 24 Caprices and a two-disc set of Bach’s complete solo violin works that was released in 2022. Kim is the founder and artistic director of the Lake Champlain Chamber Music Festival (LCCMF) in Burlington, Vermont. In addition to its explorative programming and extensive work with living composers, LCCMF created the ONE Strings program through which all 3rd through 5th grade students of the Integrated Arts Academy in Burlington study violin. The University of Vermont recognized Soovin Kim’s work by bestowing an Honorary Doctorate upon him in 2015. In 2020, he and his wife, pianist Gloria Chien, became artistic directors of Chamber Music Northwest in Portland, Oregon. He and Chien were awarded Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s 2021 CMS Award for Extraordinary Service to Chamber Music. Kim devotes much of his time to his passion for teaching at the New England Conservatory in Boston and the Yale School of Music in New Haven.