The Manhattan String Quartet

Critically acclaimed as one of America's leading ensembles, The Manhattan String Quartet is celebrating its 39th season. Hailed by Michael Steinberg of the Boston Globe as “a national treasure”, the Manhattan Quartet has appeared throughout the United States, Europe, Canada, Mexico and South America. Notable among its many recordings is the complete cycle of 15 Shostakovich string quartets which TIME Magazine called “One of the most important musical events of 1991”.

The group has been Quartet-in-Residence at Colgate University for the past sixteen years, and has also held similar posts at the Manhattan School of Music, Cornell University, Grinnell College, Western Connecticut State University, the Chamber Music Institute in Racine, Wisconsin and Michigan’s Interlochen National Music Camp (for 21 summers). The Quartet’s teaching activities also include its own annual KentMusic String Quartet Conference in June, and annual European conferences focusing on major works in the string quartet repertoire hosted in the cities where these pieces were composed.

Well known for their performances of 20th-century “classics”, the Manhattan String Quartet has established a significant international reputation as today’s pre-eminent interpreter of the fifteen string quartets of Dmitri Shostakovich. Recent performances of this complete cycle have been presented in New York City at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, Town Hall and the Kaye Playhouse of Hunter College; in Paris on French National Radio; at the International Shostakovich Festival in Troy, NY; and in college and university settings throughout the United States. 

The Quartet performs and teaches regularly in the musical capitals of Europe including Paris, Prague, Budapest, Leipzig and Vienna and has appeared in South America, Mexico, Portugal and Canada. In the autumn of 2005, the Quartet made its first tour of Asia and played to sold-out houses in Nagoya and Tokyo, Japan.


Adding to a large LP discography, the Manhattan String Quartet has recorded a number of works on compact discs. In addition to their 6-CD Shostakovich set, other releases include a Mozart/Beethoven pairing of live concert recordings on MSQ Enterprises; Schubert's Quartets Nos. 14 & 15 ("Death and the Maiden") on two Centaur CDs; "Adagio for Strings" on Newport Classic, featuring Dvorak's "American Quartet” and popular encores by Turina, Wolf, Puccini, Kern, Gershwin and Barber; Carl Maria von Weber's Quintet for Clarinet and Strings with clarinetist Jon Manasse on XLNT; and a KOCH International CD with flutist Doriot Anthony Dwyer, featuring works by William Bergsma, Amy Beach, and Donald Francis Tovey.
Updated – January 2008