2025
Marking 50 years since the composer’s death, we are excited to be performing a five-concert odyssey through the complete string quartets – works that enshrine Shostakovich’s inner life, loves and closest friendships.
Concert 1 – Jan 29th
Concert 2 – Feb 28th
Concert 3 – March 27th
Concert 4 – April 29th
Concert 5 – May 29th
More info here: https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/2025/series/shostakovich-quartets-intimate-portraits
2024
We’re excited to have started a new residency! The Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama (supported by The Albert and Eugenie Frost Music Trust, with additional funding from the Colwinston Charitable Trust) has launched a bold and transformative two-year string quartet residency for 2 string quartets – The Carduccis and the Fibonacci Quartet.
This innovative program places world-class string quartet practice at the core of the College’s vibrant community, aiming to influence the future of string playing across Wales and beyond.
Helena Gaunt RWCMD Principal
Our 18th Carducci Festival at Highnam centred around the piano and we were thrilled to welcome our wonderful pianist friends and collaborators, Lara Melda and Katya Apekisheva. We also worked with the incredible Sean Shibe for the first time, performing together at the Bath Festival before heading to Helsinki for the Lauttasaari Music Festival.
Other memorable highlights included revisiting our Shostakovich Letters programme with the brilliant Anton Lesser at the Chiltern Arts Festival, joining our good friend Craig Ogden at the Dean & Chadlington Summer Festival, and sharing the stage with Dame Sheila Hancock at the Ryedale Festival, where she reflected on her life through music.
Our final stop of the summer was the Kilkenny Arts Festival in Ireland and it was a joy to return and reconnect with so many familiar faces. Performing the iconic Different Trains at the Set Theatre on our last night was an unforgettable experience.
Looking ahead, we have a busy Autumn season including performances at the Leicester and Two Moors Festivals, Dartington, Kings Place, and the Wigmore Hall. We’re also preparing for some exciting projects to mark the 50th anniversary of Shostakovich’s death in 2025. Watch this space!
There were so many highlights to pick from in 2023, but it was incredibly special to perform the Mindful Mix BBC Prom at the Royal Albert Hall and to share the stage with the incredible VOCES8 and Ola Gjeilo. For those of you that didn’t get a chance to watch it, it is still available on BBC iPlayer here:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m001q1zq/bbc-proms-2023-mindful-mix-at-the-proms
Our music & words projects continue to grow and our first performance of the Shostakovich letters in its Dutch translation took place in Ghent in March.
In June, we were thrilled to perform the world premiere of Roderick Williams’ new string quartet arrangement of “Die Schöne Müllerin” with him, at the closing concert of the Aldeburgh Festival. During the Festival we also had the amazing experience of performing the Van Bree Allegro for Four Quartets, sharing the stage with the Brodsky, Heath and Van Kuijk quartets. We returned to Snape in September to perform with the incredible jazz singer, Jacqui Dankworth, and her amazing Jazz Trio, to a packed out audience.
Another highlight, was performing Peter Gregson’s complete Quartets at the Purcell Room joined by Peter Gregson himself on synths, before taking part in the immersive “Patina” premiere at the Southbank Centre. It’s certainly been a year of eclectic and inspirational collaborations.
December saw us visiting numerous schools throughout Gloucestershire, working with GCSE and A level music students and encouraging them in their composing journeys. We look forward to receiving some wonderful entries into our Young Composers Competition, which continues to go from strength to strength. The deadline for 2024 entries is February 18th.
2022
A concert version of the play by Myla Lichtman-Fields
World Premiere
We are thrilled to be premiering this new work at the Barbican on November 24th 2022. The music and words programme shines a spotlight on the complex relationship between the Mendelssohn siblings and provides an insight into the struggles of a female musician in the C19th.
Fanny’s music is placed firmly centre stage, as letters between the siblings, adapted into a two-person play by Maya Lichtman-Fields, interweave the movements of her expressive String Quartet and a selection from her ground-breaking Das Jahr (arranged especially for the project by Emma Denton).
https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/2022/event/carducci-quartet-fanny-and-felix
Royal Philharmonic Society Enterprise Fund in association with Harriet’s Trust.
During the pandemic, Emma had time to fulfil a long term dream of hers; to devise a music and words programme based on Shostakovich’s string quartets. The Carducci Quartet were thrilled to premiere the resulting ‘Shostakovich: Life, Letters & Friendship’ at the Barbican last autumn with the incredible actor and director Samuel West.
The quartet were also thrilled to be recipients of the RPS Enterprise Fund which enabled them to expand on the music and words programme and to bring the Felix and Fanny project to fruition.
Collaborations
The pandemic led us to connect digitally with audiences and fellow musicians alike. We formed some wonderful and ‘remote’ collaborations:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=GmLN5G3eyuM
and connected with the incredible playwright/screenwriter, Myla Lichtman-Fields. Her vision and generosity in reworking her play ‘Felix & Fanny’ for this project enabled it to come to fruition and we can’t wait to finally meet her in person at the premiere!
2021
We’re delighted to be premiering a new music and words programme about the life of Shostakovich! It will take place at the Barbican in London on Nov 9th. This project was created during lockdown with support from the RPS Enterprise Fund, in association with Harriet’s Trust.
The programme sets Shostakovich’s quartets against historical sources and letters, read by actor and director Samuel West.
We are very excited about this performance and hope to see you there!
Information from the Barbican website:
’Take a journey deep into Shostakovich’s psyche, as he walked a delicate tightrope balancing political pragmatism with personal expression against the backdrop of Josef Stalin’s tyrannical Soviet regime. Historical sources and letters from the composer to one of his closest confidantes, read by actor and director Samuel West, are paired with extracts from contemporaneous quartets, painting a fascinating picture of how music offered a much-needed emotional outlet in the most difficult of times.
Guiding you through the perilous politics and personal highs and lows are the Carducci Quartet. One of the UK’s leading string quartets, their credentials as leading interpreters of Shostakovich were cemented in 2015 with an ambitious, seven-hour marathon of all 15 quartets – a five-star undertaking The Guardian described as ‘truly extraordinary’.’
https://www.barbican.org.uk/whats-on/2021/event/shostakovich-life-letters-friendship
We hope you’re all keeping well. We were delighted to take part in a recreation of a concert from the Wigmore Hall in 1920 – an all Stravinsky concert with readings from the reviews etc. A fascinating event recorded here:
We are very much hoping for more live concerts this autumn – (including a concert for Oxford Coffee Concerts) and are currently updating our concerts page!
Here is our video from the Oxford Coffee Concert series earlier this year:
We really missed performing for and meeting audiences during lockdown. One of our first lockdown projects was with Julian Bliss remotely – recording the finale from Weber’s clarinet quintet. Here is a link to us performing together from our homes:
2020
In these difficult times we decided to start a new project to help support young musicians in the early stages of their careers. With freelance work being decimated by the pandemic, we have set up a new string orchestra – the Serenata String Orchestra – initially recording together remotely and hopefully performing live together in the future! Supported by the Concordia Foundation and the Carducci Trust, we have been able to provide young musicians with valuable recording experience, recording fees and royalties from streaming and downloads.
Please do have a listen online!
Youtube – https://youtube.com/channel/UCGUrZvWMgE7pHsevwDgFJUw
Spotify – https://open.spotify.com/artist/0eEJreeWbRXyIywQaZxVg5?si=Io_-mkSnRS-vPircxlRVpw
Apple Music – https://music.apple.com/gb/artist/serenata-string-orchestra/1525035209
Also on Amazon – ask Alexa!
In Beethoven’s 250th anniversary we will of course be performing many of his quartets and delving deeper into his music. Beethoven has always felt like the pinnacle of the repertoire for us, so this will be an exciting year! We begin with an immersive experience – ‘The Beethoven Weekender’ at London’s Barbican, where we will perform movements from his quartets alongside actor Simon Callow, who will read from Beethoven’s letters.
Following this in February we will perform Beethoven quartets at two of our favourite venues – the Holywell Room in Oxford and Syde Tithe Barn in Gloucestershire. Other immersive experiences include a weekend of Beethoven quartets at the Bath Festival (27-29th March) and later in the year for Concerts at Cratfield (12-13th September).
2019
The first few months of 2019 have been busy with some exciting new projects! We collaborated with wonderful clarinettist Emma Johnson in giving the word premiere of Stephen Johnson’s quintet ‘Angel’s Arc’ in Cadogan Hall, London, followed by further performances in Guildford and Warwick. We also performed on a new recording of music by Ian Venables for Signum Records, alongside singers Allan Clayton and Mary Bevan and pianist Graham J Lloyd. Concerts abroad included Saarbrucken in Germany, the Musika:Musica Festival in Bilbao, where we were delighted to join Britten Sinfonia in Elgar’s Introduction and Allegro. We also had an Irish tour with the superb Julian Bliss (clarinet), performing David Bruce’s ‘Gumboots’ to enthusiastic audiences in Cork, Sligo, Wexford and Kilkenny. We travelled to Rome for a very memorable concert in the exquisite Quirinale Palace (pictured) followed by a trip to Naples (we even got to visit Pompeii)!
Our first ‘Carducci in the Cotswolds’ in Cheltenham was a sell-out success and we are planning another event in Moreton in Marsh this December. This is already close to sold out so get in touch soon if you would like to make a booking!