KCMETROPOLIS Review

KCMETROPOLIS Review

By Kristin Shafel Omiccioli

After hitting it off as students at the UMKC Conservatory of Music and Dance, Kansas City natives violinist Laurel Morgan and cellist Sascha Groschang maintained their friendship and officially formed alternative strings duo The Wires in 2009. Since then, the pair has found fresh arrangements of pop hits to perform, run a Creative Strings Workshop in the summer, and recorded and released its eponymous debut album in early 2013.

On Friday night, Morgan and Groschang took the stage on the lawn of the Kansas City Museum for a two-hour concert of contemporary string music, including a few covers and mostly originals from their album. While the cover arrangements were well done and it was fun to hear recognizable tunes (songs by the Beatles and Muse, for example), The Wires’ own compositions were far more compelling. Displaying a wide range of musical influence, The Wires’ impressive oeuvre shows traces of American jazz and blues, alt-rock, and dance and folk music from around the world, underscored by Morgan and Groschang’s highly developed technical abilities.