### Event Description: Catalyst Quartet with Todd Palmer

**Date and Time:** May 5, 2025, at 7:30 PM (Pre-concert talk at 6:30 PM)

**Location:** Sunset Center, Carmel-by-the-Sea, CA

**Event Overview:**
Join us for an enchanting evening with the renowned Catalyst Quartet, featuring the exceptional clarinetist Todd Palmer. This concert promises a captivating blend of classical and contemporary music, showcasing the extraordinary talents of these acclaimed musicians.

**Program:**
- **David Bruce:** *Gumboots* (2008)
- **Samuel Coleridge-Taylor:** *Quintet in F-sharp Minor for Clarinet and Strings, op. 10*

**Performers:**
- **Catalyst Quartet:**
  - Karla Donehew Perez, violin
  - Abi Fayette, violin
  - Paul Laroia, viola
  - Karlos Rodriguez, cello
- **Todd Palmer, clarinet**

**About the Artists:**
The Catalyst Quartet is celebrated for its perfect ensemble unity and exceptional execution. They have performed at prestigious venues such as the Kennedy Center, Carnegie Hall, and have been featured at numerous international music festivals. The quartet is committed to diversity and education, often engaging in residencies and workshops.

Todd Palmer is a three-time Grammy-nominated clarinetist known for his versatility and collaborations with top-tier ensembles and vocalists. He has premiered significant works and performed globally, earning accolades for his contributions to classical and contemporary music.

**Tickets:**
Purchase your tickets now to experience this unique musical event. Don't miss the pre-concert talk at 6:30 PM for an insightful introduction to the evening's program.

For more information and to buy tickets, visit our [website](#).

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This event is a must-see for classical music enthusiasts and those looking to experience the dynamic synergy between strings and clarinet. Join us for an unforgettable night of music at the Sunset Center.

Catalyst Quartet with Todd Palmer

Sunset Center

The Catalyst Quartet, known for "perfect ensemble unity" and "unequaled class of execution" (Lincoln Journal Star),  has toured widely throughout the United States and abroad, including sold-out performances at the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., at Chicago's Harris Theater, Miami's New World Center, and Stern Auditorium/Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall in New York. The quartet has been guest soloists with the Cincinnati Symphony, New Haven Symphony, St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, and the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá, and has served as principal players and featured ensemble with the Sphinx Organization's featured ensemble, the Sphinx Virtuosi, on six national tours. They have been invited to perform at important music festivals such as Mainly Mozart in San Diego, the Great Lakes Chamber Music Festival, Sitka Music Festival, Juneau Jazz and Classics, Strings Music Festival, and the Grand Canyon Music Festival, where they appear annually. The Catalyst Quartet was ensemble-in-residence at the Vail Dance Festival in 2016 and in the 2021-22 season were in residence with San Francisco Performances where they presented the complete series of works from their Uncovered Project. In 2014, they opened the Festival del Sole in Napa, California with Joshua Bell and participated in England's Aldeburgh Music Foundation String Quartet Residency with two performances in Jubilee Hall. In 2022 the Catalyst Quartet was named ensemble in residence for the Chamber Music Northwest Festival in Portland and for the Met Museum's LiveArts series in NYC.

Catalyst Quartet with Todd Palmer, clarinet

Hear excerpts from David Bruce’s Gumboots and John Adams’ Alleged Dances, and experience a collaboration between the RNCM and the Northern Ballet School.

EPSG:4326

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Written during his summer in Spillville Iowa, Antonín Dvořák’s American Quintet draws on influences he saw as uniquely American — African-American spiritual melodies, taught to him by composer Henry T. Burleigh, and rhythms from Native American music, which he discovered through the traveling Kickapoo Medicine Show. Other pieces on this program reflect similar influence. David Bruce’s Gumboots is derived from the Apartheid-era South African dance, and Louis W. Ballard’s Ritmo Indio is a study in American Indian rhythms.

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The Artist in Residence for the 2025/2026 season will meet the curator of the Eigenzeit Festival: In a unique artistic encounter between human voice and mandolin, Avi Avital and Kamalini Mukherji will concluding the "Music of Now – Eigenzeit" festival with a joint program that juxtaposes the classical music of the West with that of the Indian subcontinent in a fluid exchange. The evening's artists will perform music by contemporary British composer David Bruce, who explores the hours of the day and their particular moods in his new work for voice, mandolin, sarod – an Indian long-necked lute – and string quartet. The changing times of day – morning, evening, and night – occupy a special place in the raga system of classical Indian music and thus also have a profound influence on the raga-based songs of Rabindranath Tagore. This inspired Kamalini Mukherji to create a program and album with a similar theme several years ago. In any case, the Duisburg audience can expect a sensual and poetic concert experience in which different musical worlds flow into one another.

David Bruce

Events

Upcoming events

May 22, 2026

Day and Night · Duisburger Philharmoniker

Past events

May 5, 2025

Catalyst Quartet with Todd Palmer · Chamber Music Monterey Bay

May 3, 2025

Catalyst Quartet with Todd Palmer, clarinet · Sunset Center

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