Critics’ Quartet

Barbican Quartet

The Barbican Quartet was founded in 2015, and is taught and supported by string quartet stars like Günter Picheler and the Quatuor Ébène. The four musicians present works by Alban Berg and Beethoven as part of the »Teatime Classics« series. 2022 was a memorable year for the Barbican Quartet: they won first prize and other special prizes at the ARD Music Competition, as well as a third prize at the Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition. The ensemble had only just found a new second violinist, and thus a new sound and style of ensemble playing, in February 2022. The Barbican Quartet has appeared at many international festivals, and has been broadcast on the radio several times. In the 2022/23 season, they produced and released their first CD. An extensive tour will take them to different parts of Europe, to Canada and the USA.

Belcea Quartet

Takács Quartet

Beethoven's quartets dedicated to the Russian ambassador in Vienna, Count Razumovsky, are some of his most famous. The first of the three is majestic in its scope, filled with both carefree melodies and tension-filled contrasts.When it comes to string quartets, Joseph Haydn was a role model and important source of inspiration for Beethoven, and there's a musical thread from Haydn's C major quartet to Beethoven's Razumovsky quartets.The ensemble tackling this music, the Takács Quartet, was founded in Hungary but is now based in the USA. They are known for their brilliant playing and innovative programs. They often collaborate with writers and artists, and at several concerts, the actress Meryl Streep has participated.The Takács Quartet also commissions music. One such initiative is the beautifully flowing Flow by American composer Nokuthula Ngwenyama, who has looked out towards space and drawn inspiration from the Big Bang and the expansion of the universe.

Belcea Quartet

Beethoven's five late string quartets are a listening adventure like no other. One of the most performed and beloved is No. 14, with opus number 131. Here, it seems as if Beethoven is searching for the freedom of thought and soul through his music. Perhaps that's also why this music speaks so strongly to us, with its warmth, imagination, and intensity, transcending all historical barriers. And the slow, dense first movement is among the most beautiful ever created for a string quartet.The Belcea Quartet is one of the world's most prominent string quartets. The quartet has performed at Konserthuset Stockholm on several occasions previously, including in a series of concerts featuring all of Beethoven's string quartets.Here, instead, the quartet combines Beethoven with Arnold Schönberg, whom many associate with twelve-tone music. But Schönberg was a great romantic, and the string quartet we hear here, the first of four numbered ones, was his first truly major composition. It is music brimming with wild energy and swelling late romanticism, composed in 1905 in Vienna, a city that had a significant influence on Schönberg with its vibrant art scene and Freud's psychological investigations.

BELCEA QUARTET

Continuing its close collaboration with the Pierre Boulez Saal, the Belcea Quartet returns to Berlin for two concerts. Following a performance of string quartets by Arnold Schoenberg and Ludwig van Beethoven, the four musicians will be joined by students of the Barenboim-Said Akademie two days later for the rousing String Octet by 16-year-old Felix Mendelssohn.

CHIAROSCURO QUARTET

A critic once described the first encounter with the Chiaroscuro Quartet as a “shock for the ears.” Over the past two decades, the group has come to be regarded as the leading string quartet for historically informed performance practice, and with their adventurous interpretations the four musicians transform even familiar repertoire classics into unexpected discoveries. A fixture of past Pierre Boulez Saal seasons, the ensemble has chosen works by Haydn, Beethoven, and Schubert for its latest program.

JACK QUARTET

Pierre Boulez’s Livre pour quatuor is among the most complex chamber music works of the 20th century. At the same time, the score—left unfinished by the composer—also has a fragmentary quality. The JACK Quartet, regularly heard at the Pierre Boulez Saal over the last few seasons, performs individual movements from Boulez’s only string quartet, pairing them with recent works by Eva­-Maria Houben and Anthony Cheung, among others, and the String Quartet in Four Parts by Boulez’s contemporary John Cage.

HEATH QUARTET

Josef Suk’s close bond with his composition teacher Antonín Dvořák was not merely artistic—he was also his older colleague’s son­-in-­law. The Heath Quartet juxtaposes Dvořák’s String Quartet Op. 51, known as the “Slavonic” due to its many allusions to Czech folk music, with Suk’s meditation on an ancient chorale for Wenceslas, the patron saint of Bohemia. Written on the eve of World War I, the composition is a plea for peace and protection as well as an expression of new­ found Czech patriotism. Works by Benjamin Britten and Joseph Haydn complete the program.

LEONKORO QUARTET

Over the course of two seasons, several acclaimed ensembles have performed Jörg Widmann’s String Quartets Nos. 6–10 at the Pierre Boulez Saal. Titled “Studies on Beethoven,” these five works offer a contemporary creative response to the works of one of the greatest composers of all time. The concert cycle concludes with the young Leonkoro Quartet perform­ ing Widmann’s Ninth String Quartet, which was written in 2022 as the last of the group

Simply Quartet

Internationalität ist Trumpf: Gegründet in China, ausgebildet unter anderem in Madrid, beheimatet in Wien – kein Wunder, dass das Simply Quartet immer große Ziele verfolgt. Als ehemalige »ECHO Rising Stars« kehrt das Ensemble nun nach Köln zurück.Die Mitglieder des Simply Quartet sind stets auf der Suche und möchten das Verständnis für Musik immer wieder neu vertiefen, ob bei klassischen oder bei modernen Werken. Dient »Simply« dabei als Beschreibung ihres gemeinsamen Weges? Mitnichten: »In Schanghai gab es nahe des Konservatoriums ein Restaurant namens ‚Simply Thai‘. Das hat uns allen gefallen.« Das Simply Quartet schöpft aus Einflüssen, die das Miteinander bis heute prägen. Dazu zählt neben China und Österreich auch Norwegen, das Heimatland des Cellisten.