News

2025

Sep 14th

Shostakovich this autumn

This autumn we’re delighted to have several chances to continue exploring and celebrating the extraordinary music of Shostakovich.

✨ Cowbridge Music Festival – 13 September
✨ Sarratt Festival of Music – 20 September
We join forces with wonderful collaborators for Shostakovich’s dramatic and much-loved Piano Quintet.

Bantry House, Ireland – 24–26 October
A very special weekend, performing the complete cycle of all 15 Shostakovich quartets in the unique and atmospheric setting of Bantry House.
https://www.westcorkmusic.ie/concert-series/shostakovich/

Holywell Music Room, Oxford – 8 November
Continuing our Shostakovich journey in Oxford – an opportunity to hear quartets 8, 10 and 2 in the intimacy of the Holywell Room.
https://oxfordphil.com/event/shostakovich-celebration-2/

Chichester Chamber Concerts – 4 December – Quartets 10, 8, 2
https://www.chichesterchamberconcerts.com/4th-december-2025

Nicholas Yonge Society – Lewes – 5 December – Quartets 10, 8, 2
https://www.nyslewes.org.uk/

Hope to see you along the way!

For full concert listings click https://carducciquartet.com/schedule/

Jul 20th

A New Perspective on Die schöne Müllerin

This autumn, we’re excited to be hitting the road with the wonderful Roderick Williams, performing his own arrangement of Schubert’s Die schöne Müllerin for voice and string quartet.

We’ve worked with Roddy on several projects over the years, and each collaboration brings something truly special. This one feels particularly close to our hearts. His reimagining of Die schöne Müllerin offers a fresh lens on a piece we’ve all known and loved for years—transforming the familiar piano textures into an expressive string quartet landscape.

The result is an intimate and immediate experience, both for us as performers and, we hope, for the audience. Rather than the quartet simply replacing the piano, Roddy’s arrangement invites a real dialogue between the voice and strings. It’s been a joy to explore the emotional world of the miller together—sharing in the innocence, longing, heartbreak, and beauty that run through the cycle.

We’ll be touring the programme this autumn with dates around the UK and beyond, and we can’t wait to share it with you.

Upcoming Dates:

    •    Fairford – 23rd Sept
    •    St Martin-In-the-Fields – 25th Sept
    •    Milngavie – 26th Sept
    •    Wiltshire Music Centre – 28th Sept
    •    York – 1st Oct
    •    Cumnock Tryst – 3rd Oct
    •    Gent (Belgium) – 5th Oct
    •    Shrewsbury – 10th Oct
    •    Oxford – 20th Oct

 

May 31st

On the Road!  – June 2025

Summer’s warming up, and so is our concert calendar! If you’re a fan of intimate, expressive chamber music, June is a perfect time to catch us live. From charming market towns to major concert halls – we’re performing a great range of repertoire across England.

Here’s a look at where we’re headed:

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Kicking Things Off in the Yorkshire Dales

June 3 – Swaledale Festival, Richmond
The month starts with a scenic stop at the Swaledale Festival in North Yorkshire, where we’ll be performing Ravel, Schubert, and Caroline Shaw’s Entr’acte. If you’ve never heard Shaw’s work live, it’s a total treat—contemporary and mesmerizing.

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A Weekend by the Sea

June 9–11 – Kirker Music Festival, Eastbourne
Next we head south to Eastbourne’s elegant Grand Hotel for a few days of music by Haydn, Beethoven, Dvořák, and others. Think sea breezes and string quartets—hard to beat!

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Sunday Morning Music in London

June 15 – Wigmore Hall, London
Back in the capital, catch us mid-month for a Sunday morning concert at Wigmore Hall. On the menu: Schubert’s youthful E-flat quartet and Dvořák’s much-loved “American” quartet. It’s the kind of programme that will hopefully leave you floating out into the day!

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Summer Sounds in the Wye Valley

June 22 – Ross-on-Wye
Later in the month, we are in Ross-on-Wye at the lovely St Mary’s Parish Church. This concert includes music by Hubert Parry—fitting, since our festival just down the road, is in Parry’s home village and church in Highnam.

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A Big Finish at Aldeburgh!

June 25 – Aldeburgh Festival, Snape Maltings
To close out the month, we land at the iconic Aldeburgh Festival. The programme features Beethoven’s stormy ‘Serioso’, Shostakovich’s intense 12th quartet, and a brand new work by composer Daniel Kidane. There’s even a pre-concert talk if you like to dig into the music beforehand. 

More details at : https://carducciquartet.com/schedule/

Jan 23rd

Shostakovich at the Barbican!

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

Oct 19th

New Residency @ RWCMD

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.

“This exciting new residency brings two extraordinary string quartets into the College, at very different stages of their careers, and each with unique energy and vision at a pivotal time for the arts.
We are providing them with a creative base in a creative community, and stability to grow their artistry in an environment that nurtures collaboration and innovation.  But it’s not just about musicians perfecting their craft; it’s about making a real difference. In today’s climate of real challenges for the arts, the quartets together with our students will become increasingly embedded within local communities through public engagement, working in education and even healthcare.
We want to equip our students to be impactful leaders in society, and to build both the artistic skills and practical experience to be able to do this.”

Helena Gaunt RWCMD Principal

https://www.rwcmd.ac.uk/news/royal-welsh-college-of-music-drama-unveils-innovative-residency-for-two-award-winning-string-quartets
 
Aug 30th

Summer Festival Highlights and Exciting Plans Ahead!

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!

Jan 8th

Looking back at 2023!

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

Apr 13th

Felix & Fanny in concert – RPS Enterprise Fund

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

Nov 1st

Shostakovich: Life, Letters & Friendship

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

Jul 28th

Online performances – update!

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: