presented by the National String Quartet Foundation in the Autumn Season 2020
The Goethe-Institut Irland is delighted to support the National String Quartet Foundation in it’s celebration of Beethoven’s 250th birthday together with the Arts Council and RTE.
Eight quartets will be presented, all based in Ireland or including Irish players, in a season of forty seven concerts for promoters nationwide. The season features performances of all Beethoven’s string quartets, with the complete cycle of quartets being played in Cork and in Dublin. The Foundation is also grateful for the support of University College, Cork, Cork City Council and Cork County Council.
Due to current Covid-19 measures the upcoming concerts will be streamed online. For more information and booking, please click here.
Please download the programmes in advance from the Foundation's website.
Programme:
LIR QUARTET
Patrick Rafter
Siobhan Doyle
Ed Creedon
Killian White
Beethoven - Quartet in F major Op.18 No.1
Beethoven - Quartet in E flat major Op.127
The Lir Quartet opens this celebration of the 250th anniversary of Beethoven’s birth. Originally founded for Barry Douglas’ 2017 Clandeboye Festival, this will be the Lir’s fifth tour for the Foundation. The F major quartet Op.18, No.1, written when Beethoven was in his late twenties, is full of brilliance and energy, the passionate slow movement depicts the tragic tomb scene from Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. The majestic, expansive E flat major quartet Op.127 from 1825 is the first of the five quartets Beethoven wrote in the last years of his life. The ending remains one of the most magical and uplifting moments in music.
Mullingar - Thursday September 17th at 8pm - Mullingar Arts Centre
Limerick - Friday September 18th at 8pm - Belltable
Cork - Saturday September 19th at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Christchurch -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday September 20th at 3pm - National Concert Hall - CONCERT CANCELLED
BANBHA QUARTET
Lidia Jewloszewicz-Clarke
Maria Ryan
Robin Panter
Aoife Burke
Beethoven - Quartet in D major Op.18 No.3
Beethoven - Quartet in F major Op.59 No.1
The Banbha Quartet is a new string quartet made up of four of our finest chamber musicians. They present what is believed to be the first of the Op.18 quartets to have been written, the gentle and subtle No.3 in D major, together with the first of the three Op.59 quartets commissioned in 1806 by prince Andrey Razumovsky, the Russian ambassador to Vienna. Although only six years separate these works, the F major Op.59, No.1 is on a much vaster scale and depicts a truly epic musical landscape
Manorhamilton - Thursday October 1st at 8pm - The Glens
Portlaoise - Friday October 2nd at 8pm - Dunamaise Arts Centre
Cork - Saturday October 3rd at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Arts Centre -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday October 4th at 3pm - National Concert Hall
VANBRUGH QUARTET
Keith Pascoe
Elizabeth Charleson
Simon Aspell
Christopher Marwood
Beethoven - Quartet in G major Op.18, No.2
Beethoven - Quartet in E flat major Op.74 ‘The Harp’
The Vanbrugh Quartet was based in Cork from 1986 to 2017 and gave close to three thousand concerts worldwide as well as releasing more than thirty CDs of repertoire ranging from the complete Beethoven quartets to many contemporary Irish works. Members of the Vanbrugh Quartet come together once more to take part in this unique celebration of Beethoven’s music. They will present the charming and witty G major quartet Op.18 No.2, written in 1800, and the glorious E flat quartet Op.74 from 1809, the same year as the ‘Emperor’ piano concerto and a year which saw Vienna bombarded and occupied by Napoleon.
Mullingar - Thursday October 15th at 8pm - Mullingar Arts Centre
Ennis - Friday October 16th at 8pm - glor
Cork - Saturday October 17th at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Arts Centre -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday October 18th at 3pm - National Concert Hall
ESPOSITO
Mia Cooper
Anna Cashell
Joachim Roewer
William Butt
Beethoven - String Quartet in E minor, Op. 59, No. 2
Beethoven - String Quartet in A minor, Op. 132
The Esposito Quartet comprises four of our most distinguished musicians with a combined wealth of experience as recital artists, orchestral leaders and teachers, who have been playing as a quartet since 2010. The Razumovsky quartets presented a greater range of drama and expression than had so far been known in this medium, and the two dramatic chords and ensuing silence that open No.2 in E minor set the tone for what follows. The A minor quartet Op.132 was written nineteen years later and is celebrated particularly for the extraordinary Heiliger Dankgesang [Song of Thanksgiving] which forms its slow movement.
Castleconnell, Co. Limerick - live event cancelled, a streamed concert will be announced
Listowel - Wednesday October 28th at 8pm - St John’s Arts Centre
Cork - Thursday October 29th at 1pm AND 8pm - Triskel Arts Centre, co-production with Cork Orchestral Society -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Sligo - Friday October 30th at 8pm - Calry Parish Church, The Mall, Sligo
Dublin - Sunday November 1st at 3pm - National Concert Hall
CONTEMPO QUARTET
Bogdan Sofei
Ingrid Nicola
Andreea Banciu
Adrian Mantu
Beethoven - Quartet in C major Op.59, No.3
Beethoven - Quartet in B flat major Op.130
Formed in Bucharest in 1995, Galway’s Ensemble in Residence since 2003 and RTE’s Resident Quartet from 2013 until 2019, the multiple award-winning ConTempo Quartet is Ireland’s longest established string quartet. The third of the Razumovsky quartets takes string quartet vituosity to new levels in its electrifying finale, while the outer movements of the late B flat quartet Op.130 frame four contrasting miniatures including the desolate Cavatina
Wexford - Sunday November 15th at 3.30pm - Jerome Hynes Theatre at the National Opera House
Cork - Thursday November 19th at 8pm - Triskel Arts Centre, co-production with Cork Orchestral Society -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Tinahely - Friday November 20th at 8pm - The Courthouse Arts Centre
Dublin - Sunday November 22nd at 3pm - National Concert Hall
CARDUCCI QUARTET
Matthew Denton
Michelle Fleming
Eoin Schmidt-Martin
Emma Denton
Beethoven - Quartet in C minor Op.18, No.4
Beethoven - Quartet in F major Op.135
The versatile and award-winning Anglo-Irish Carducci Quartet was founded in 1997 and has won numerous international competitions, including the Concert Artists Guild Competition 2007 and Finland’s Kuhmo International Chamber Music Competition 2004. The fourth in the set of Op.18 quartets is in Beethoven’s turbulent key of C minor and the first movement is highly theatrical in its portrayal of restlessness and conflict. The F major quartet Op.135, almost the last music that Beethoven wrote, is serene and conversational, its divine slow movement giving way to the finale entitled Der schwer gefaßte Entschluß [The difficult resolution]
Mullingar - Thursday November 26th at 8pm - venue tbc
Waterford - Friday November 27th at 7.30pm - venue tbc
Cork - Saturday November 28th at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Arts Centre -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday November 29th at 3pm - The National Concert Hall
FICINO QUARTET
Elaine Clark
Lynda O'Connor
Nathan Sherman
Ailbhe McDonagh
Beethoven - Quartet in B flat major Op.18, No.6
Beethoven - Quartet in C sharp minor Op.131
Ficino Ensemble was formed by Artistic Director Nathan Sherman in 2012 as a flexible group aiming to perform popular chamber music alongside lesser known works that deserve to be appreciated. The Quartet features four outstanding musicans who are building an impressive reputation and an exciting repertoire. Their programme is one of the most contrasted in this series: the jollity of the first movement of Op.18, No.6 and the playful eccentricity of the Scherzo, even the rueful Malinconia [melancholy] of the last movement will set the architectural majesty of the C sharp minor quartet in stunning relief.
Ballina - Thursday December 3rd at 8pm - Ballina Arts Centre
Limerick - Friday December 4th at 8pm - Belltable
Cork - Saturday December 5th at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Christchurch -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday December 6th at 3pm - National Concert Hall
PIATTI QUARTET
Nathaniel Anderson-Frank
Michael Trainor
Tetsuumi Nagata
Jessie Ann Richardson
Beethoven - Quartet in A major Op.18, No.6
Beethoven - Quartet in F minor Op.95
Beethoven - Grosse Fuge Op.133
Prizewinners at the 2015 Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition, the Piatti Quartet has performed in major venues and festivals throughout the UK and worldwide. The final programme in this series is again one of great contrasts. The charm of the most Mozartian of Beethoven’s quartets, Op.18, No.5, gives way to the concentrated drama of the Serioso quartet Op.95 and finally to the extremes of violence and beauty expressed in the Grosse Fuge, the cathartic ending of which is the nearest we can get to a symphonic experience in these dark days
Cork - Saturday December 12th at 12.30pm AND 3pm - Triskel Christchurch -
Introduced by Evelyn Grant
Dublin - Sunday December 13th at 3pm - National Concert Hall
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