Jack Quartet Performs"Beautiful Trouble" by Natacha Diels

The performance is based on television's "The Twilight Zone" or Robert Ashley’s TV opera "Perfect Lives"

Made up of violinists Christopher Otto and Austin Wulliman, violist John Pickford Richards, and cellist Jay Campbell, the JACK Quartet recently performed  “Beautiful Trouble” — a 5-act live performance by Natacha Diels about simplicity and beauty.

Presented at the Roulette's Theater in Downtown Brooklyn, each act (or episode) describes a particular mini-plot in the style of television’s “The Twilight Zone” or Robert Ashley’s TV opera “Perfect Lives.”

"The oversaturation of our current era is the driving force behind “Beautiful Trouble’s” focus on simple human beauty," the artists write. "The work is representative of The New Discipline, a practice of contemporary art influenced by Fluxus, Dada, the Uncanny Valley, and the social impact of ubiquitous cameras. It incorporates narrative, video, staging, and choreography to craft social commentary."

The below concert is the second performance of the work, after the premiere at Penn Live Arts in January 2024.

Composer Natacha Diels’ work combines choreographed movement, improvisation, video, instrumental practice, and cynical play "to create worlds of curiosity and unease."

Natacha is a founding member of the composer/performer collective Ensemble Pamplemousse which specializes in unique new music composition.

Her notable commissions include those from the Borealis Festival, the Fromm Foundation for the Talea Ensemble; the Nadar Ensemble for Darmstadt International Summer Institute; the Los Angeles Philharmonic for the Green Umbrella Series; and the Deustchland Radio Kultur in Berlin for Ensemble Adapter .

She has served as the artist-in-residence for Harvestworks in partnership with the MATA festival. Her work has been performed globally by Ensemble Adapter, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Nadar Ensemble, hand werk, Ensemble Decoder, TAK Ensemble, Quatuor Impact, JACK Quartet; and soloists Jay Campbell, Laura Cocks, Samuel Favre, Ross Karre, Rane Moore, and Charlotte Mundy, among others.