Kronos Quartet & Alim Qasimov Ensemble

In 2008, the Aga Khan Music Initiative and the San Francisco-based Kronos Quartet inaugurated a pioneering musical collaboration that brings the quartet together with leading musicians from AKMI countries to compose, arrange, and perform new music rooted in regional traditions. The second KMI-Kronos collaboration features works for the Quartet and the Alim Qasimov Ensemble and presents Azerbaijani songs performed by the Quartet with Alim and Fargana Qasimov and instrumentalists, who play tar, kamancha, balaban, and naghara. Songs were arranged first by Alim Qasimov and subsequently by American performer-composer-arranger Jacob Garchik, who created the string quartet parts.