The Unseen Harmony: How the Atenea Quartet Redefined Music Through the Merita Project
Stories | June 19, 2025
Welcome to a unique auditory and artistic journey, where classical music intertwines with social exploration, innovation, and human connection. In this episode of the Merita Project podcast, the Atenea Quartet invites us behind the scenes of The Unseen Harmony – their groundbreaking project developed during their residency in the Netherlands as part of the MERITA platform, co-financed by the European Union.
A Platform Where Music Meets Heritage and Humanity
The MERITA platform is not just a site for chamber music. It’s an interactive network where talented musicians, Historic sites, mentors, and organizers meet across Europe. It offers new forms of thinking about chamber music through experimentation, cross-cultural exchange, and the return to more meaningful and intimate performances in off-beat places.
The philosophy of the Atenea Quartet has been to live this way. Their time at the Merita residency has been anything but typical.
From Sound to Sightless Connection
Their project, The Unseen Harmony, challenges an interesting question: What happens when one abstracts sight from music? How do musicians communicate, play, and connect when one of the most fundamental senses – vision – is no longer present?
By working together with blind individuals from the VISU association in Ede, the quartet experimented with playing blindfolded, back to back, or scattered round a circle away from each other. The result: a heightened sensitivity of hearing sense, the discovery of new ways of listening, and a new way of interacting both within the quartet and with the audience.
As Bernat puts it, “It made things very difficult, but it also made us open our ears more than ever before.”
The Residency Experience: A Three-Week Transformation
In Ede, the musicians practiced embodiment and emotional communication, diving into deep interpersonal explorations beyond what they might ever experience in normal masterclasses.
During the String Quartet Biennale Amsterdam, they were immersed in a situation of performances and masterclasses in the presence of wonderful quartets and coaches. Later, a third week was an introspective return to nature, where breathing exercises, audience interaction, and artistic identity took over the schedule. This residency was different in its holistic orientation.
A Circle of Sound: A New Concert Format
One of the most striking things about The Unseen Harmony is the concert format. The quartet does not perform in the usual stage-audience orientation. Instead, they sit in a circle, at times quite spaced from one another, at times blindfolded – and even ask the audience members to join the center.
The result is a live, surround-sound experience in which each listener hears the music differently, depending on where they are. For one set of listeners, it’s like they’re being treated to a solo show by a single musician. For another, it’s like they’re somehow sitting inside the music.
A Socially Engaged Musical Journey
What makes this project particularly moving is its humanity. In one moment described by the quartet, they improvised a song with Joy, a visually impaired woman. It became one of the most touching and musically inspiring moments of the entire residency.
This project wasn’t merely about playing music in a different way – it was about going against assumptions, building empathy, and creating art that is socially responsible, emotionally authentic, and profoundly personal.
Looking Forward
As they prepare to take this project into the future, the Atenea Quartet anticipates continuing their own identity as an ensemble rooted in the individual values and artistic personality of the group. They’ve already received considerable interest from concert promoters who are excited about this untraditional format, and they feel confident that they are ready to grow further.