Fitzwilliam String Quartet | May Concert

Join us for a mesmerising performance by the much-revered Fitzwilliam String Quartet this May.

 

Wolf - Italian Serenade

Britten - Quartet No.3, Op.94 

Beethoven - Quartet in A minor, Op.132

 

“The Fitzwilliam String Quartet, in my opinion, is, and has been for many years, Britain’s premier string quartet ensemble.” - Jerry Dubins, Fanfare magazine, USA

 

International recognition came early for the FSQ as the first group to record and perform all fifteen Shostakovich string quartets, drawing on the players' personal connection with the composer. Shostakovich travelled to York to hear FSQ’s performance of his thirteenth quartet, and this musical friendship (the composer’s own word) prospered from then on. The FSQ has appeared regularly across the world, while making several award-winning recordings for Decca, Linn, and Divine Art. 

 

Alan George, a founding member of the Quartet, comments:

"The Fitzwilliam was hugely fortunate to have been around at the right time and place, back in 1972, when Dmitri Shostakovich visited them in York to hear them play. That association set us on our way – but we’re saving his music for you until July! However, when we became the first group to play his friend Britten’s No.3 (that is, following the year’s exclusivity granted to its dedicatees, the Amadeus), and subsequently undertook twenty performances in 1978 alone, it almost felt like it could have been Shostakovich’s 16th! Britten was a marvellous pianist, and – together with his partner Peter Pears – would have played many of Hugo Wolf’s extraordinary Lieder: this Serenade is not only a rare instrumental work, but a precious moment of release for his tortured mind. Beethoven himself was one of the first great composers of Lieder, and it is the timeless (but wordless!) Holy Song of Thanksgiving which is at the centre of this second of his other-worldly final group of quartets."

 

• Location: Clare Hall Dining Room, Clare Hall, Herschel Road, Cambridge CB3 9AL, United Kingdom

• Contact for further information: music@clarehall.cam.ac.uk or 01223 332360

• Accessibility details: full step-free access, accessible toilet, lift.

• Find directions on how to get to Clare Hall and contact details here.