For the last concert of its 29th season, the Molinari Quartet presents an event around Dimitri Shostakovich’s string quartets.

The Quartet According to Shostakovich is a three day event featuring the complete cycle of Shostakovich’s 15 string quartets in concert on May 28, 29 and 31 at 7:30 pm at the Conservatoire de musique de Montréal.

Considered one of the most important string quartet cycles alongside those of Beethoven and Bartok, Shostakovich’s quartets were written over a span of 36 years, from 1938 to 1974. He planned to write a quartet in each of the 24 tonalities, but his project was stopped at 15 quartets due to illness, the last being written at the hospital, a year before his death.

Throughout his life, chamber music was for him, like a shelter from the official music he had to write for the Soviet regime.

The concerts will be preceded by a Dialogue on Tuesday May 26 at 7:30 pm at the Maison de la culture Plateau Mont-Royal, 465 Avenue du Mont-Royal Est.