MATA PRESENTS 2026

MATA Presents at Carnegie Hill Concerts: “STRING QUARTET” - A World Premiere composed by Kebra Seyoun Charles performed by DragonBoot Quartet

Tuesday, February 24. 2026 at 7:30PM
TICKETS
Pay-what-you-choose (Suggested $30)

Church of Advent Hope
111 East 87th Street - NYC
(bet. Park/Lexington)

DragonBoot Members: 

Katya Moeller and Catherine Carson, violins, Sydney Whipple, viola, Lila Holyoke, cello

How does one listen to music? How is a listener’s experience affected when listening to works in their entirety or albums as unified conceptual entities? How does that experience change when one focuses on individual movements?

In addition to their quartet, Kebra has requested various movements of our quartet repertoire that inspired them in this musical collaboration. As we have chosen to perform select movements of larger works (rather than pieces in their entirety), we will discuss different approaches to listening throughout the performance, and how this sampled manner of listening alters the listener’s (and performer’s) experience.

The PROGRAM:

Janáček String Quartet No. 2 (“Intimate Letters” mvmt)

Haydn String Quartet in B Minor, Op. 33 No. 1 (mvmt 3)

Korngold String Quartet No. 2, op. 26 (mvmt 1)

Beethoven String Quartet in F Major, Op. 135, (mvmts 2 and 4)

Charles String Quartet (World Premiere)

Biography:

Dragon Boot

Built on years of deep musical collaboration, the DragonBoot Quartet embodies artistic connection. The ensemble’s members bring together musical relationships spanning more than eleven years, alongside chamber partnerships developed consistently over the past four. The DragonBoot String Quartet represents the culmination of these long-standing collaborations, uniting at last through The Juilliard School’s Honors Chamber Program in 2024.

Within their first six months together, the quartet earned Grand Prize at the Coltman Chamber Music Competition in Austin, Texas, and Second Prize at the St. Paul String Quartet Competition. Most recently, they participated in The Perlman Music Program’s Chamber Music Workshop, where their mentors included Donald Weilerstein, Laurie Smukler, and Itzhak Perlman. 

Upcoming performances include outreach initiatives at Rikers Island, appearances in Juilliard’s Paul Hall and the David Rubenstein Atrium in New York City, and a recital for the Artist Series Concerts of Sarasota. As an all-women ensemble, the DragonBoot Quartet is especially committed to performing works by women composers, with the intention of amplifying their voices and sharing this repertoire with diverse audiences.

Kebra-Seyoun Charles

Kebra-Seyoun Charles (they/them) is a double bassist and composer recognized for an integrated approach to performance and creation that moves fluidly across genres. As a soloist, chamber musician, and composer, Kebra’s work blends classical forms with influences from jazz, gospel, pop, and R&B, resulting in a distinctive musical language they describe as “Counterclassical.” Their music has been praised for its rhythmic vitality, expressive range, and ability to balance formal rigor with accessible, groove-driven writing.

Kebra has received numerous awards, fellowships, and commissions for both performance and composition, and has appeared as a soloist with major orchestras as well as in leading contemporary music ensembles. Their work spans concerti, ballets, chamber music, and interdisciplinary collaborations, and has been presented in concert halls, festivals, and cultural institutions internationally. Recordings and broadcasts of their performances have reached wide audiences through prominent classical and media platforms.

In addition to their solo career, Kebra is a dedicated collaborator and educator, frequently working within ensembles and creative teams to shape new musical experiences from within. Their artistic practice is closely tied to advocacy and education, with projects that encourage young musicians to rethink tradition, identity, and expression in classical music. Through performance, composition, and mentorship, Kebra continues to push the boundaries of the classical canon while fostering a more inclusive musical community.

February 12-22, 2026
(Special Members/Donors Event: TBA)

Ellen Stewart Theatre @La MaMa

66 East 4th Street
New York, NY 10003

Tickets:

Adults: $35 Adults
Support the Artist Tickets: $50 – $75 
Students/Seniors: $30 
La MaMa Members:$10 

10 @ $10 Tickets: First ten tickets to every performance are $10 each (limit 2 per person)

Ticket prices are inclusive of all fees.

A thingNY Production

Presented in association with Amanda+James, Anti-Social Music and MATA

An operatic monodrama of virtuosic chants, rants, songs and spectacle, surveying toxic masculinity through the ages by needling Anglo-Saxon epics with personal anecdote and pseudo-history.

Paul Pinto is a writer, composer, performer, opera-sermonizer, and multi-disciplinary dabbler. Kristin Marting is an award-winning director and writer of hybrid performance

Artist credits: 

Written, Composed and Performed by Paul Pinto

Developed with and Directed by Kristin Marting

Lighting and Projection Design by Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew

Sound Design and Mixing by Philip White

Associate Lighting Design by Alex deNevers

Performed with Erin Rogers (sax), Zach Herchen (sax), and Dennis Sullivan (percussion)

Line Produced by Amanda + James

Production Managed by Erica Schnitzer

Technical Directed by Ben Elling

Stage Managed by Katie Scibelli

Plucked from the tradition of the medieval storytelling bard, MANO A MANO is an operatic monodrama about toxic masculinity, needling Anglo-Saxon epics with personal anecdote, pseudo-history, Antonio Banderas movies, tangents about the Romans, boxing, and stories about New Jersey.

Writer/performer Paul Pinto embodies all the characters across a five-octave range of timbres: sweet, throaty and viscerally guttural. Posing the question "what if Sir Gawain and Beowulf were fighting over killing the same dragon?" he answers with ninety minutes of virtuosic chants, rants, song and spectacle, as he bobs and weaves between passages of puckishly quick verbiage and aching melancholia. Director Kristin Marting stages it in the round with the audience immersed in the action, surrounded by a mix of wild saxophone and percussion improvisation.

Crediting:

La MaMa presents 
a thingNY production of 
MANO A MANO: an operatic monodrama

Presented in association with Amanda+James, Anti-Social Music and MATA

With development support from Ancram Center for the Arts, ComPeung AiR, Con Vivo Music, Eastern Mennonite University, HERE, James Madison University, Mana Contemporary, Mount Tremper Arts, NACL, and Resonant Bodies Festival

Marketing support from American Opera Projects, Experiments in Opera, and Opera on Tap