Zehetmair Quartet

Founded in autumn 1994, the Zehetmair Quartet embarked upon its first concert tour in spring 1998. Their success resulted in re-engagements by all the promoters, followed by invitations to the United States and Japan to complement the Quartet’s annual European tours. Furthermore, the Zehetmair Quartet is a welcome guest at famous international summer festivals such as the Edinburgh Festival, the Helsinki Festival and the Schleswig Holstein Musik Festival. Among the outstanding, artistic challenges of the season 2007/08 is the cyclic performance of all of the String Quartets by Robert Schumann at Wigmore Hall London, as well as the world premiere of the String Quartet no. 2 by Heinz Holliger, a commissioned work of Cologne Music GmbH for the Zehetmair Quartet. On the occasion of an extensive concert tour throughout the US in November 2007, the Zehetmair Quartet has been enthusiastically celebrated by audience and press. The Zehetmair Quartet records exclusively for the label Ecm. The first Cd featuring Bartók’s Quartet no. 4 and Hartmann’s Quartet no. 1 (2000) as well as the recording of Schumann’s Quartets no. 1 and no. 3 (2003) have been awarded numerous prizes, for example the “Quarterly Prize” by the Deutsche Schallplattenkritik, the Gramophone Award (“Record of the Year”), the “Diapason d’Or of the Year”, the “Dutch Edison Classical Music Award 2004”, the Belgian “Caecilia Award” and the “Klara Award for the best international production of the year”. The latest Cd on the Ecm label with Hindemith’s String Quartet no. 4 and Bartók’s String Quartet no. 5 has been released in March 2007. In November 2007, also this recording received the “Diapason d’Or of the Year” in a ceremony in Paris. The Zehetmair Quartet possesses a multifarious repertoire and will play three different programmes during the season 2007/08.