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SACCONI
QUARTET
Ben
Hancox violin
Hannah
Dawson violin
Robin
Ashwell viola
Cara
Berridge cello
 Formed
in 2001 at the Royal College of Music, the Sacconi Quartet is rapidly
gaining an enviable reputation as one of the outstanding quartets of their
generation. The Quartet won 2nd
Prize at the 2006 London International String Quartet Competition, along
with the Esterhazy Prize & Sydney Griller Award, following their 1st
Prize win in the 2005 Trondheim International String Quartet Competition.
They also won the Kurtág Prize
at the Bordeaux International String Quartet Competition, 1st
Prize in the Royal Over-Seas League chamber music competition and were
shortlisted for a
Royal Philharmonic Society
award. In 2006 the Quartet was
selected for representation by Young Concert Artists Trust (YCAT), and the
same year was awarded an Angel Award by The Herald newspaper for
outstanding performances in the Edinburgh Festival.
Engagements
last season included return visits to Wigmore Hall, concerts at Cadogan
Hall, St. George’s Bristol, the Canterbury, Bangor New Music, Bury St.
Edmunds, Winchester and Lichfeld Festivals.
Abroad the Quartet has appeared at the Holland Festival in
Amsterdam, the St. Olav Festival in Trondheim, Norway and given recitals
in Geneva, Barcelona, Germany and France.
They have collaborated with many of today’s leading chamber
musicians in quintet, sextet and octet concerts, and will tour the UK
during 2008-9 with the Navarra Quartet as part of Music in the Round’s Around
the Country series.
This
season, plans include a series of concerts in Switzerland and debut
recitals in the Musikverein in Vienna and the Liceo da Cámara series in
Madrid. The Quartet will also
tour throughout the UK with Acoustic Triangle, the renowned classical-jazz
trio, performing written and improvised music in some of the country’s
most spectacular cathedrals and abbeys.
The
inaugural Sacconi Chamber Music
Festival at Folkestone will take place in May 2008, during which the
quartet will give a weekend of recitals alongside a wide-ranging programme
of outreach work, taking concerts into schools, prisons, residential care
homes and centres for refugees and asylum seekers.
The
Quartet’s recording of Finzi’s song cycle By Footpath and Stile with baritone Roderick Williams was released
on Naxos in 2006 and received four- and five-star reviews in all the
national broadsheets and BBC Music Magazine.
In 2007 the Quartet gave the world premiere of John Metcalf’s
first string quartet, and in 2008 they will premiere Robin Holloway’s
String Quartet No.2 in Madrid and Brancaster.
The
Sacconi Quartet is a member of the Royal College of Music’s New
Generation Scheme, supported by the Worshipful Company of Musicians.
They pursue a keen interest in education work, collaborating with
the Cavatina Chamber Music Trust and others, making regular visits to
schools, hospitals and community venues.
The
Quartet has an active Friends and Patrons network, and always welcomes new
members. For all details,
please see www.sacconi.com.
The
name
Sacconi Quartet
comes from the outstanding twentieth-century Italian violin maker and
restorer Simone Sacconi, whose book The
Secrets of Stradivari is considered an indispensable reference for
violin makers.
Reviews
Die
feine Englische Art
Sacconi
Quartet in Bensheim
The
Sacconi Quartet could rise to the level of the top quartets such as the
Quatour Ebèn if they continue their work at the level they displayed in
their first concerts in Germany.
Frankfurter
Allgemeine Zeitung, October 2007
The
excellent Sacconi Quartet
Evening
Standard, July 2006
Both
performances revealed the warmly attuned ensemble of this outstanding
young quartet. And they caught
to a nicety both the melancholy within Elgar’s musical expression of the
passage of time, and the impassioned energy of his own composing present.
The
Times, June 2007
The
Sacconi’s performance of Britten’s Second Quartet had genuine
substance, combined with a seemingly effortless command of the
composer’s difficult string-writing.
The
Daily Telegraph, April 2006
This
might be playing with an element of the freshness and impetuosity of
youth, but it is also playing with a depth of understanding.
The
Herald, August 2006
An
exceptional ensemble with sharp ears, a unanimous sense of musical breath
and a meticulous attention to details.
Beautifully
well-balanced playing, delicate, serious and formal.
Enthralling and engaging performance.
Patron
Sir Peter Maxwell Davies
Vice-Presidents
The Countess of
Leicester
, The Marquess of Cholmondeley,
Lord Simon of Highbury, Lord Broers
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