Collaborations

For the Fry Street Quartet, collaboration is a practice of reciprocity—an act of listening across disciplines, identities, and ecosystems. These projects grow from long-term relationships with artists, thinkers, and communities, where music becomes a shared language for exploring the deepest questions of our time.

Rather than perform at the edge of science, social issues, or identity, the Fry Street Quartet seeks to perform within them—inhabiting the tensions, the beauty, and the complexity of our entangled world.

The Crossroads Project

A pioneering collaboration with physicist Dr. Robert Davies, The Crossroads Project blends original music, science communication, and visual media to explore the realities of global sustainability. Featuring scores by Laura Kaminsky and Libby Larsen, and imagery by painter Rebecca Allan and photographer Garth Lenz, the project has toured nationally and is featured in the quartet’s album The Crossroads Project and accompanying film Rising Tide. Together, these works invite audiences to move from understanding to action.

Lek: Listening at the Edge

In collaboration with composer Nicolás Lell Benavides, this recent commission braids string quartet with field recordings of the imperiled sage grouse. Lek will be featured in a new documentary film—currently in production—that explores the music, landscape, and communities surrounding one of the American West’s most iconic and endangered species.

NOVA Chamber Music Series

As Quartet-in-Residence and former Music Directors of Salt Lake City’s NOVA Chamber Music Series, the FSQ has helped shape seasons of adventurous programming. NOVA has become a laboratory for connection—between musicians and audience, tradition and innovation, regional and global voices.

Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music

The FSQ enjoys an ongoing relationship with composers from the Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Academy of Music, particularly through Frank’s Composing Earth initiative. These collaborations support new commissions, educational partnerships, and seasonal residencies that deepen the quartet’s engagement with climate-conscious creativity.

Recent Collaborative Performances

Hawaii
Hawaii Opera Theatre presents As One

Indiana
IUPUI Entanglements Series presents TCP

Kansas
Lyric Opera of Kansas City presents As One

Minnesota
College of Saint Benedict and Sait John’s University present TCP

Nebraska
Arts for the Soul presents TCP

Utah
Moab Music Festival presents TCP
Intermountain Sustainability Summit at Weber State University presents TCP
Salt Lake City Unitarian Universalist lecture series presents TCP
University of Utah presents TCP at the Leonardo Museum

New York
The Chautauqua Institution presents As One

Texas
Del Mar College presents TCP

“The singers and the players of the Fry Street Quartet co-exist and interact in the same space, creating a world that was as fantastical and dreamlike as it was gritty and real. This is a piece that haunts and challenges its audience with questions about identity, authenticity, compassion and the human desire for self-love and peace.”

— Opera News

As One

Equally at home exploring the environmental and the personal, the Fry Street Quartet also premiered As One, Kaminsky’s chamber opera with film, which tells the story of a transgender individual. The New York Times wrote, "As One forces you to think, simultaneously challenging preconceptions and inspiring empathy … [with] winning humor and a satisfying emotional arc.” The New York Classical Review raved, "As One is everything that we hope for in contemporary opera: topical, poignant, daring, and beautifully written."

Since its premiere at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 2014, As One has become the most produced new opera in North America. The FSQ is pleased to have an ongoing relationship with this beautiful work, so relevant to the social discourse of our time.