Over the past four decades, the Shanghai Quartet has become one of the world’s foremost chamber ensembles. Formed at the Shanghai Conservatory in 1983, the Quartet’s elegant style, impressive technique, and emotional breadth allow the group to move seamlessly between masterpieces of Western music, traditional Chinese folk music, and cutting-edge contemporary works.
Recent performance highlights include performances at Carnegie Hall, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Freer Gallery (Washington, D.C.), the Festival Pablo Casals in France, and Beethoven cycles for the Brevard Music Center, the Beethoven Festival in Poland, and throughout China. The highlight of the 2023 Shanghai Quartet’s 40th anniversary celebration was their China premiere performance of John Adam’s Absolute Jest for String Quartet and Orchestra with the Shanghai Symphony.
The Quartet also frequently performs at Wigmore Hall, the Budapest Spring Festival, and Suntory Hall, and has collaborations with the National Centre for the Performing Arts and Shanghai Symphony Orchestras.
Among innumerable collaborations with eminent artists, they have performed with the Tokyo, Juilliard, and Guarneri Quartets; cellists Yo-Yo Ma and Lynn Harrell; pianists Menahem Pressler, Peter Serkin, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Yuja Wang; pipa virtuoso Wu Man; and the vocal ensemble Chanticleer. The Shanghai Quartet appears regularly at many of North America’s most prominent chamber music festivals, including annual performances for Maverick Concerts, the Brevard Music Center, and Music Mountain.
The Shanghai Quartet has a long history of championing new music, with a special interest in works that juxtapose the traditions of Eastern and Western music. They have commissioned works from an encyclopedic list of the most important composers of our time, including William Bolcom, Sebastian Currier, David Del Tredici, Tan Dun, Vivian Fung, Lowell Lieberman, Zhou Long, Marc Neikrug, Krzysztof Penderecki, Bright Sheng, Chen Yi, and Du Yun. The Quartet had a particularly close relationship with Krzysztof Penderecki; they premiered his third quartet—Leaves From an Unwritten Diary—at the composer’s 75th birthday concert and repeated it again at both his 80th and 85th birthday celebrations. Forthcoming and recent commissions include new works from Judith Weir, and Tan Dun, in addition to a new work from Penderecki.
The Shanghai Quartet has an extensive discography of more than 30 recordings, ranging from Schumann and Dvořák piano quintets with Rudolf Buchbinder to Zhou Long’s Poems from Tang for string quartet and orchestra with the Singapore Symphony. The Quartet has recorded the complete Beethoven string quartets and is currently recording the complete Bartók quartets.
The Shanghai Quartet joined The Tianjin Juilliard School in fall 2020 as resident faculty. From 2002 to 2021, they served as Quartet-in-Residence at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University. The Quartet is also the Ensemble-in-Residence with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra and visiting guest professors of the Shanghai Conservatory and Central Conservatory in Beijing. They are proudly sponsored by Thomastik-Infeld Strings and BAM Cases.