Picasso Quartet

It might just be worth an hour or two to check out the new Picasso String Quartet at Noe Valley Chamber Music this weekend. The players are all graduates of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. The eldest of them, violinist Alisa Rose, plays with Quartet San Francisco and the Real Vocal String Quartet, among others.

The rest of the players are no slouches either. Violinist Natasha Makhijani was assistant concertmaster at SFCM and at the Eastman School of Music, and is now a member of the Monterey Symphony Orchestra, among other commitments.

Violist Alexa Beattie has won numerous awards and scholarships throughout her studies and is a core member of sfSoundGroup, while cellist Michelle Kwon boasts membership in the Magik*Magik Orchestra, the Fresno Philharmonic, and is doing post-graduate work with Jennifer Culp at SFCM.

The group will play quartets by Ravel, David Garner, and Mendelssohn (Op. 80) – all of them, coincidentally or not, with F as a keynote.