Season 2026/27 WHAT'S ON

Attending a concert by the Quatuor Ébène is always an exceptional musical and sensual happening. In the past two decades the quartet has set new standards through its recordings and performances, and established itself as one of the handful of quartets that are at the summit of musical excellence.

Founded in Paris in 1999, the quartet has a reputation for purity of sound, thrilling virtuosity, and an intense rapport with its audiences. Its versatility is celebrated, with the New York Times once remarking that this was ‘a string quartet that can easily morph into a jazz band’. Quatuor Ébène's albums – with celebrated recordings of Bartók, Beethoven, Debussy, Haydn, Fauré and Mendelssohn already to its credit - have received numerous awards, including Gramophone, BBC Music Magazine, and the Midem Classic Award. Their musical partnerships have included the countertenor Philippe Jaroussky, baritone Matthias Goerne, and cellist Gautier Capuçon (the latter being two artists who have also appeared for Camerata Musica). Together with violist Antoine Tamestit, Quatuor Ébène recorded the Mozart String Quintets K. 515 and K. 516 in 2023, an album which has gone on to be garlanded with prizes.

The quartet has appeared in all the major concert halls of the world, including the Philharmonie de Paris, the Alte Oper Frankfurt, Carnegie Hall New York, and the Vienna Konzerthaus, Berlin Philharmonie, as well as the Verbier and Salzburg Festivals.

Instruments

Pierre Colombet plays two violins: a 1717 Antonio Stradivari, the ‘Piatti’ and a 1736 Matteo Goffriller.

Gabriel Le Magadure plays two violins: one by Pietro Guarneri of Venice (the ex-‘Baron Rothschild’) and a violin from around 1740, attributed to Guarneri.

Marie Chilemme plays two violas: a 1734 Stradivari and one by Marcellus Hollmayr, Füssen, from 1625.

Yuya Okamoto plays a violoncello by Giovanni Grancino, Milan, from 1682.

As France’s leading national daily Le Monde commented when this two-guitar version of Bach’s keyboard masterpiece was first heard in 2025, ‘Thibaut Garcia and Antoine Morinière have created a transcription of Johann Sebastian Bach’s Goldberg Variations that may well spark the same artistic shockwave unleashed exactly seventy years ago by the revolutionary pianist Glenn Gould (1932–1982)’ – whose 1955 recording caused a sensation in the musical world.

Although still in his early thirties, French-Spanish guitarist Thibaut Garcia is one of the most acclaimed classical guitarists of his or any other generation, praised for playing that combines the highest virtuosity and poetic sensitivity in equal measure. This project takes its origin from a deep artistic friendship with his fellow guitarist Antoine Morinère and offers an entirely fresh take on Bach’s masterpiece, revealing subtleties of structure and counterpoint often obscured by the modern grand piano.

The arrangement, by Garcia and Morinière themselves, is the result of a full year of work during which, in their own words, they focused on ‘how to adapt the keyboard work for two guitars, while preserving the illusion of a single performer’. Twin guitars helped in their artistic endeavour: the performance is on two guitars cut from the same tree, and realized especially for the project by luthier Hugo Cuvillier.

Their recording of the work issued in 2025 by Erato has been greeted by glowing praise. The leading British music review, Gramophone, extolled their ‘absolute commitment to structural clarity on the one hand and [their] nuanced approach to embellishment on the other. Thus the tonal palette is radiant and varied…[and with] a true singing legato’. There have been guitar transcriptions before, but ‘none, however, so convincingly achieves the evocation of an earlier sound world while effortlessly absorbing Bach’s musical language into the classical guitar’s unique expressive idiom’.

Photo credit: Simon Fowler 

The Belcea Quartet has established itself in the last quarter-century as one of the world’s most celebrated chamber-music ensembles. Founded in 1994 and mentored by members of the Alban Berg and Amadeus Quartets, the ensemble brings together musicians of very different artistic provenance: the Romanian violinist Corina Belcea, The Korean-Australian Suyeon Kang on second violin, the Polish violist Krzysztof Chorzelski, and the French cellist Antoine Lederlin. This diversity is reflected in the Belcea Quartet’s repertoire. Its performances of world-premieres of new works go hand-in-hand with its profound connection with the great works of the Classical and Romantic periods.

The ensemble’s repertoire spans Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven to Bartok, Janacek to Szymanowski. They also continue to introduce new works by current composers to the audience such as Guillaume Connesson (2023), Joseph Phibbs (2018), Krzysztof Penderecki (2016), Thomas Larcher (2015) and Mark-Anthony Turnage (2014 & 2010).

In addition to the complete recordings of the String Quartets by Bartók, Beethoven, Brahms (Diapason d’or de l’année 2016) and Britten, the quartet’s wide-ranging discography includes works by Berg, Dutilleux, Mozart, Schoenberg, Schubert, Shostakovich, Janáček and Ligeti (among others). In spring 2022, Alpha Classics released the two String Sextets by Brahms performed with Tabea Zimmermann and Jean-Guihen Queyras.

Their performances of all Beethoven String Quartets at the Konzerthaus Vienna in 2012 were released on DVD by EuroArts in 2014, followed by the release of a recording of Britten’s three String Quartets in 2015. From 2017 to 2020, the quartet has held the prestigious position of Ensemble in Residence at the Pierre Boulez Hall in Berlin. In addition, the quartet last season became a partner ensemble at the Vienna Konzerthaus, where they have been a familiar presence for the best part of two decades.