Upbeats: Season 4, Bonus episode 2: Interview with Christiana Mavron (Mavron Quartet) Artwork

Braving the Stave

Hosted by Jonathan James and joined by Angharad Smith, a.k.a ‘JJ & Haz’ , this bubbly duo delve through all music and genres, sharing with you their personal favourite pieces, along with some musical jokes that add a playful and informal feel to the podcast. Working as part of Arts Active's Cardiff Classical programme, we run lots of exciting extras alongside it to support the concerts. Check out the Arts Active website for more - www.artsactive.org.uk
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Yn cael eu cyflwyno gan Jonathan James, yng nghwmni Angharad Smith, neu ‘JJ a Haz’ fel y’u gelwir, mae’r ddeuawd fyrlymus hon yn pori drwy bob math o gerddoriaeth a genres, gan rannu gyda chi eu hoff ddarnau personol, ynghyd â rhai jôcs cerddorol sy’n ychwanegu teimlad chwareus ac anffurfiol i’r podlediad. Gan weithio fel rhan o'r rhaglen Gyfres Glasurol Actifyddion Artistig, rydym yn cynnal llawer o bethau ychwanegol cyffrous ochr yn ochr ag ef i gefnogi'r cyngherddau. Edrychwch ar wefan Arts Active i gael mwy - www.artsactive.org.uk
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Braving the Stave

Upbeats: Season 4, Bonus episode 2: Interview with Christiana Mavron (Mavron Quartet)

May 21, 2025 • Arts Active • Season 4

JJ interviews Christiana Mavron ahead of the Mavron Quartet's performance in the Arts Active Lunchtime Concert Series, on 3rd June 2025.

Cardiff Classical Lunchtime Recitals: The Mavron Quartet - Arts Active

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Transcript – Bonus Episode – Interview with Christiana Mavron

Hello and welcome to this bonus episode of Braving the Stave where I'm joined by Christiana Mavron, who is the leader and founder of the Mavron Quartet, and they will be playing in Eglwys Dewi Sant on Tuesday, the 3rd of June, as part of the lunchtime series that is being curated there by Arts Active and they will be playing this lovely complementary pairing of Prokofiev's String Quartet #1 and a later Mozart Quartet in D Minor. Chrissie, hello.

Hello Jon, how are you?

Very nice to see you again. We met just before COVID, I believe. And we were going to do this joint thing about violin concertos, but sadly, that that was not to be.

That was… That's true, yes. We got cut off mid-flight.

But here we are, and we're talking about your quartet.. I'm glad to see you didn't have many difficulties naming the quartet. You've gone for... you have such a strong surname, Mavron. I think that works a treat.

Yes, it was very imaginative. We did struggle with a name and we were under pressure to put something... I think we were applying for something at the time, so we were down to the last minute, down to the line, so we just went with my surname because like you say, it's a little bit unusual, it's got Greek origins, but I think it's slightly memorable so that's how we became the Mavron Quartet.

Absolutely. So you mentioned Greek origins there, but I believe that most of you met at the Royal Welsh College of Music, is that right?

We did. Originally, we were all studying at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and we just formed a string quartet whilst we were all studying and continued. I should say that the members have changed over the years, as they tend to do in long-running quartets and I am the surviving member, as it were.

Wonderful. So how long has it been running?

So 2002 we started officially at the college and it was great at the college because the following year, I think in 2… no, 2004 we were awarded a junior fellowship, which really helped us, sort of, have a little platform to set up a website and basically gave us our stepping stones.

Wonderful. And I… well, you can't help but notice that this is an all-female quartet, certainly in its current iteration, has it always been so?

No. We did at one point have a male violist, Ben was with us for a short period shortly before Niamh joined us, who's currently in the quartet.

Right. I was just wondering whether that was part of the founding vision or whether that, sort of, also fed through into your commissioning or anything like that.

It wasn't a conscious choice, but it has worked really well, being all-female and I think we are very keen to work with, like, female composers and other female artists. We just like working and collaborating with lots and lots of different people and exciting projects.

I noticed that. I noticed on your website that you've done things with, well, a performance of Macbeth with PULP, with T Rex tribute bands. Is that right? And… ALL sorts!

Yes, we're very eclectic. I think we love the variety of the work that you can do as a string quartet. So, for instance, you could play at weddings, the kind of conventional side of a string quartet and functions. And we've played for royalty. We've been at Buckingham Palace to play and then

Oh I say, when was that?

like you say… Ohh this is going back. In, oh, maybe 2006 or 2007. It was an investiture that we played at, and also like you say PULP, we played with PULP last year, did on of their concerts in Cardiff, which was really fun. And we also work quite heavily with Welsh [inaudible] as well. We’ve recorded a few albums for Gareth Bonello and we're he's back on tour this month I think. Next week we're doing a concert with him. So yeah, I just love the variety.

Tell me who he is. I'm so sorry.

Oh, he's based in Cardiff and his band’s The Gentle Good. And he sings in Welsh and English and writes his own music and performs all over. I think he's been… he had an award to go and study in China so one of his previous albums was based on Chinese and Welsh folk music, which he asked us to play on.

How wonderful. I can't imagine that. I can't imagine that. So that set me scurrying to look him out. Thank you so much for that. And that reflects a little bit, I mean this eclecticism, as you call it, all this variety, reflects your own portfolio as a solo musician and the other ensembles that you play with, I noticed that you've been to Saudi Arabia to play on the Harry Potter score and various other travels with Alfie Boe, Michael Ball. You've been all over the place.

Yes. Again, very, very varied. I play… most of my freelance work is with Welsh National Opera, so I love playing opera, occasionally going with the BBC Orchestra here as well. But then yeah, I've played with, I've played with Kanye West and played at the Brit Awards.

Years and years ago this is.

Ohh, you're so cool. You're so cool.

Well, at the time. Sometimes I don't know who these artists are. I have to hold my hands up, and then once I've worked with them, I sort of realise how... maybe, how well known some of these people are.

Well, that's very honest of you. So, we can safely say, I think, that the composers you've chosen for this recital on the 3rd of June are well known. Mozart and Prokofiev. Are you starting with the Prokofiev?

We’re starting with the Mozart, actually. We're gonna start with Mozart.

Just because it's the longer piece and we, sort of… the Mozart is a way of getting us to settle into a performance the Prokofiev, it starts off very… it basically feels like a race that's already started, the way the music starts.

It's full of energy and purpose, yes.

Yes. Yeah. So it's straight off the starting blocks with the Prokofiev. So the Mozart kind of eases us and probably the audience into the recital.

It's a very gentle beginning, that sign motif that you have in the first violin, and it draws us into this pathos, I think. It's the only quartet in this set that he dedicated to Haydn that's in a minor key, which in itself isn't significant because that was often the case, you often had at least one that was in a minor key, but D minor I think is a favourite minor key of his.

He used it later for his famous piano concerto in the same key. And it's… what's interesting about this particular quartet, and it's quite a late one. It's K.421, isn't it? And…

It's very harmonically interesting and harmonically rich, isn't it?

Yes. The minor key is unusual because Mozart, we tend to think of fun and he was quite a fun and comical character. So, for him to write in a minor key feels very unusual for Mozart and very operatic as well. The opening I feel is… feels like an opening to an opera.

It's very melodic, it's very engaging straight away and interestingly, I thought this was quite interesting, that normally composers of the time wrote for commissions and this one was just written for his pure enjoyment.

And I suppose in homage to Haydn, as well, right?

Chrissie

Yes.

JJ

The whole of that set of six, which as you say, is unusual because normally you'd be trying to get the sponsorship of a patron.

Chrissie

Yes!

JJ

But it's rather touching that he sets this, or this set of works, aside for his erstwhile mentor. And what stands out for you in this quartet? Because it's full of interest, isn't it?

Yes, for me I… the third movement stands out.

Because it's a Vienese type feel. It starts off very gentle, but in the first violin there's these huge leaps of scales and arpeggios, which, to me, reminds me of Haydn.

JJ

Yes.

Chrissie

And I wonder if that's a homage to Haydn. And it's more playful, more what I think of Mozart, this kind of… we pull around the tempo a little bit and it's a… yeah just a bit more playful I think.

It's quite dramatic as well, though in parts this minuet, isn't it? I mean, it's got a playful trio, but it's, yeah.

Chrissie

Yes.

JJ

It's those dotted rhythms, and its direct address. It's… it has presence, doesn't it? Which you don't always expect, I suppose, from that middle movement.

Yes, yes. And also, towards the end of the trio, the first violin is very first violin dominant, but then the viola takes up the same theme and it just adds another depth, I think, which I think just shows Mozart's mastery of how to use the instruments and the voicing, which I think is brilliant.

He is so genius in all respects, isn't he?

Chrissie

Yes.

JJ

And is it interesting for you that the finale is in this lilting 6/8, because normally we'd expect it to dance along in a crisp 2/4 or 4/4. This would be the norm, but it has a more of a, yeah, a gentle quality, just to the time signature, doesn't it?

Yes. Yeah, it does. And it almost, again, bringing back to the, coming back to this… Mozart’s playfulness, the ending he tags on this vivace which is basically all the material that he's used before, but in a much faster and playful, sort of, almost like tag at the end, so we're playing catch up with each other.

That's a lot of fun, and it does belie, I suppose, the fact that quite a lot of the rest of it, particularly the 1st and 2nd movements, have a very thoughtful quality, a very profound quality, I think.

Yes, yeah, I think, going back to this minor feel, the first movement feels very minor and then, I think, as we go through the movements, we're less, maybe less aware of that minor, heavy, kind of, feel to it and become more absorbed in these dance metres that Mozart uses, so the second movement is… feels like a light dance. It's very lyrical. And then the third movement is this jumping arpeggios and then the 4th moment we come to a set of variations which he uses, again, masterfully. Brilliant.

It is brilliant and a very full and satisfying experience to listen to all four together, I think. And then you've paired them with Prokofiev’s first string quartet, first of two only. We don't, I suppose, normally associate Prokofiev with that genre - the medium that is the string quartet.

Yes, I mean, he was quite interested in film music so I when I first came across Prokofiev as a child, through his Peter and the Wolf piece, which I absolutely was mesmerised with and such a fantastic piece. So I think there's an element of film, programme music perhaps, and there is an element of that in his string quartets, which I think works really well. Like we mentioned earlier, it starts straight off the blocks. There's no easing into the string quartet. It's almost as if you open the door and the string quartet's been playing for hours before.

Absolutely. And you mentioned a sense of narrative and storytelling. Do you have one that you've picked as a quartet that you feel goes well with each movement or is it not quite as explicit as that?

Perhaps we haven't spoken about it as a quartet, but personally I feel this kind of feeling of movement almost like on a train, something moving that you can't stop. That relentless moving forward.

And when we were studying this out in Russia, actually one of the main pointers that we were constantly told to think about was about tempo. All our tempos were too fast, according to… we were we study with the with Rimsky Korsakov Quartet and…

What an experience that must have been to have

Oh, it was amazing. Yeah.

their perspective on things, their Russian ears.

Yes. Yeah. And just to give us that… Just to feel that we were allowed to just explore… even though there are tempo markings written in by Prokofiev there, just to maybe take things with little pinch of salt and add our own interpretation.

It just gave us that confidence to maybe explore things a little bit for ourselves.

Well, you've said how it opens with this forthright texture, it's very clear it's, I think inspired by Beethoven because he studied Beethoven's quartets quite thoroughly, didn't he, before writing this one, having not written in the genre before. And you feel there is a almost late classical template to some of the writing in the first movement at least. But it soon goes into very, sort of, Prokofian territory, doesn't it?

Yes, yes, I mean the immediate excitement is something that, kind of, peters away a little bit through the movements, because the second movement starts slow and then speeds up, and then the third movement is just a gentler speed, I feel. So, we kind of start fast and then sort of wind down through the movements a little bit.

It gets more and more introspective, doesn't it, in a way?

JJ

I felt when listening to it myself is that you start with this freshness and that sense of just being, sort of, whisked along with this wonderful sense of train-like momentum, as you put it.

Chrissie

And then… yes, you've got the slow movement that turns into a scherzo as if they're… both these principles have been, sort of, merged together. It starts to sound a little darker, I feel, and more like Shostakovich then.

Mmhm. Yes. Yeah.

And then it ends with this, as you say, the Andante, which is in some ways the emotional heart of the work. Can we talk about the slow movement? Because do you hear echoes of Shostakovich there as well?

Absolutely yes. I mean, it's very… it's like Shostakovich there's very haunting melodies and… especially the last movement, with the sweeping melodies, there's lots of sweeping melodies in there and I think Prokofiev himself thought that the last movement was his superior movement of the quartet.

He orchestrated that movement, didn’t he, that third movement for string orchestra.

Yes. Yes, he did. Yes, and yeah. And it works really well. It's similar to Shostakovich. A lot of his string quartets were orchestrated for string orchestras as well.

That's right.

Chrissie

Which works really well.

JJ

They have a fullness. They almost invite that, don't they? Their sense of drama and their sense of scale feels as if they could be orchestral, or even when you're just hearing them on four instruments.

Yes. I mean, you can hear the four instruments of really four individual voices, all got their roles to play, which works really well in a string orchestra.

Because it's particularly contrapuntal, isn't it? The finale. You have very independent part writing.

Yes, yes. And this is something we've struggled a bit with in rehearsals, is trying to work out where… which lines we want to follow through and how to balance things a bit because everything feels really important. So sometimes we just have this block sound, sometimes it can just be a bit hard to untangle in your ears maybe.

Yes.

Chrissie

So we're trying to work out ways to maybe to bring out this line a little bit more in the viola than… or maybe bring something out more in the second violin.

JJ

Beautiful.

And… but that's... I mean, that's one of the great things with this string quartet is that each quartet will probably play it very differently, so…

Well, we look forward tremendously to seeing the Mavron interpretation, inspired a while ago by the Rimsky-Korsakov Quartet as well. That sounds like a wonderful lineage to be, sort of, following in and a beautiful pairing with the Mozart as well that will open this recital on Tuesday the 3rd of June. I hope people can make it. It seems that the Eglwys Dewi Sant series seems to be very well attended, so do book early.

Yes.

JJ

Tell us, just to finish, what's next for the Mavron Quartet? What are you looking forward to doing?

Well, we're in the midst at the moment of fundraising to work on a project next year, which is based on Macbeth, and it involves string quartet and Helen Woods, who's just an amazing all-round composer, singer. So yeah, she takes on this role of one of the witches, and then she's composed this music. It's a one-hour piece and the Quartet have to get out of their seats and act as well. Take on the roles from Macbeth as well.

Wow.

Chrissie

So that's going to be a really exciting and little bit scary project hopefully for next year.

JJ

That sounds amazing. Where will that be performed?

All over Wales, hopefully.

Great. You're taking it on tour.

That's the idea.

JJ

Marvellous.

Chrissie

Yes, hopefully on tour. Yes.

Well, you heard it here first. Chrissie Mavron, thank you so much.