If you plan on tuning in to the Grammys next month for your favorite musical artists, look a little closer and you’ll see NIU faculty in the audience.

The Vermeer Quartet, along with pianist Boris Berman, has been nominated for a Grammy in the Best Chamber Music Performance category. Its CD, made up of 10 tracks of recordings by Russian composers Shostakovich and Schnittke, was recorded in 2000 and released in 2002.

This is not the first time the Vermeer Quartet was selected for a Grammy. Its recording of Haydn’s “The Seven Last Words of Christ” was nominated in 1994.

“We just found out,” laughed Richard Young, a violinist from the quartet. “The nominations have been out for a while and nobody called us. A friend of mine had to call me. Frankly, we didn’t expect it, but it’s a nice acknowledgement of not only the work we did on these two pieces, but also of our work in general.”

The Vermeer Quartet, consisting of Young, violinists Shmuel Ashkenasi and Mathias Tacke and cellist Marc Johnson, has served as a resident group at NIU since 1970. Berman, a native of Russia who trained at the Moscow Conservatory, is a professor of piano at the Yale University School of Music.

“When we first played, we all enjoyed it so much that we knew it would be thrilling to record together,” recalled Young. “Boris is a superior pianist and an unusually insightful musician. It’s his unique sense of humor that we’ll always remember when we think back to our first rehearsals together.”

Berman has appeared in more than 30 countries on six continents and his recordings include works by Prokofiev, Stravinsky and, recently, Scott Joplin. In 2000, he appeared with the Vermeer Quartet in concert at NIU.

“[Mathias Tacke] is a great teacher and a great person,” said Kara Eubanks, a junior music performance major, violin player and one of Tacke’s students. “I hope [the Vermeer Quartet] will win.”

NIU President John Peters was proud of the group.

“I think that it is fantastic that they got the nomination,” Peters said. “It was well deserved and their level of music is excellent. They are known around the world and it doesn’t surprise me since they received a nomination before.”

The Grammy Awards will be televised Feb. 8 on CBS.

The Vermeer Quartet will perform at 8 p.m. Jan. 21 at the Music Building’s Boutell Memorial Concert Hall.