‘I hope they come back here again’: Seattle Symphony brings music to prison inmates

Audience members at Benaroya Hall typically refrain from clapping between movements, a 20th-century custom spearheaded by elite critics and concertgoers bothered by commoners who felt the music so strongly they couldn’t help but cheer.

But when the Seattle Symphony brought a string quartet to the Washington Corrections Center for Women this week, the inmates in attendance didn’t just clap between the movements of String Quartet No. 3 in D Major. They stood and erupted in applause.

It’s the way Beethoven