My experience with The String Queens began in a GroupMe: Kyle Pearson, WJHU’s Concert Czar, advertising a free pass to go witness the string trio perform at Keystone Korner in Fells Point. Whichever two people liked the message first could go. I checked my Google Calendar, then returned to the GroupMe–pressing down on the message, I clicked the heart reaction.
Less than a week later, I ordered an Uber to Keystone Korner on the night of the concert. As a freshman from Kansas who’s only been to one other concert, I had little idea what to expect, and what I thought I knew going into the event proved incorrect as well. I expected a cramped, dimly lit bar where everyone was standing sweaty and reeking of beer or pot–even if it was a string trio. That was what my one prior concert had trained me to anticipate. But standing in the line outside the venue, I saw that I was mistaken. Everyone ahead of me was dressed in chic Sunday’s Best, waiting to be handed a menu with food like quail egg and seated by people dressed in professional all-black. I was wearing a blue flannel and jean shorts with a shirt that had an eagle carrying a thunderbolt on it, and I was waiting for–I thought–a night of standing on my feet and bumping into the people surrounding me.
Keystone Korner was a spacious yet comfortable, sophisticated yet homey venue. The String Queens took the stage at 9:00 p.m. They introduced themselves first: yes, they were concert performers, going on tours like this, but they were also educators by day–two of them were administrators, and one was a teacher.
They opened with a mashup they arranged that highlighted their interdisciplinary genre: “Crazy Rolling,” a combination of Ozzy Osbourne’s “Crazy Train” and Adele’s “Rolling in the Deep.” During the arrangement, the violinist and violist stood up near the climax, playing while staring one another down and conveying the emotion of the piece with their entire bodies. Once the piece resolved, the violinist joked, “Now we have our cardio for the month.”
Halfway through the concert, the violinist stepped away to replace a string that had snapped mid-song, and the violist took the opportunity to explain the creation and synergy of their group. The violist and cellist met while they each served as principal of their section in a symphony, meanwhile the violinist worked with the violist’s husband in a school. During one lunch break, the violinist expressed her stress about finding a violist for an upcoming wedding gig, and the violist’s husband connected the two. With the violist bringing in the cellist, the three met for a rehearsal but never touched their instruments once. Instead, they passed the whole time talking, becoming immediate sisters.
They were all classically trained, but none of them wanted to have the mission of their group remain within that realm. That night at Keystone Korner, they started with the mashup of Ozzy Osbourne and Adele and from there moved on to cover 90s hits, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, Aretha Franklin, The Sound of Music hit “My Favorite Things,” and more.
The String Queens’s arrangements, drawing on soulful R&B and pop but with a classical twist, are supported by their delivery. The songs would begin with shouts or boisterous count-offs, and yells of encouragement–“Come on, now!”–could be heard from one of the Queens as another would begin her solo. The violinist and violist would stand during some songs, or they would sing along to the lyrics during others.
The String Queens concert is an event that persisted even after their stage time was over. People hummed to themselves the tunes of songs from their past that they had forgotten, and others tapped their feet to music that wasn’t there anymore. Arriving back at my dorm that night, I was soothed to sleep by the dream-like opening to Michael Jackon’s “Human Nature,” but as I remembered it from The String Queens’s performance.