University of Florida Performing Arts

Program

Quartet in G Minor, op. 74, No. 3 – Haydn
Quartet No. 3 in B-flat Major, op. 67 – Brahms
Piano Quintet in E-flat Major, op. 44 – Schumann (with Joyce Yang, Piano)

To read the London Times review of the Takács Quartet, click here.
To read the Guardian Unlimited reivew of the Takács Quartet, click here.

To hear Joyce Yang performing live on NPR’s Performance Today, click here.

Recognized as one of the world’s premiere string quartets, the Takács Quartet plays with a virtuosic technique, intense immediacy and consistently burnished tone. The ensemble explores its repertoire with intellectual curiosity and passion, creating performances that are probing, revealing and constantly engaging. The Quartet has been described as having “warmth, exuberance, buoyancy, a teasing subtlety, unanimity of purpose without compromising the individual personalities of each performer, a blossoming tone, and above all the instinct to play from inside the music…” The Takács Quartet is based in Boulder, Colorado, where it has been in residence at the University of Colorado since 1983.
 
Now entering its 31st season, the Takács Quartet has performed repertoire ranging from Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert to Bartok, Britten, Dutilleux, Janacek and Sheng in virtually every music capital in North America, Europe, Australia and Japan, as well as at prestigious festivals, including Aspen, Berlin, Cheltenham, City of London, Mostly Mozart, Ravinia, Salzburg, Schleswig Holstein and Tanglewood. The ensemble is also known for its award-winning recordings on the Decca label, including, most recently, its recording of the complete Beethoven Quartet Cycle which has been awarded a Grammy® award, two Gramophone Awards, the BBC Music Disc of the Year Award (late quartets), the Classical Brits Award for Ensemble Album of the Year (late quartets) and three Japan Record Academy Chamber Music Awards. Of their performances and recordings of these Quartets, the Cleveland Plain Dealer wrote “The Takács might play this repertoire better than any quartet of the past or present.”
 
The Takács Quartet was formed in 1975 at the Franz Liszt Academy in Budapest by Gabor Takács-Nagy, Károly Schranz, Gabor Ormai and András Fejér, while all four were students. It first received international attention in 1977, winning First Prize and the Critics’ Prize at the International String Quartet Competition in Evian, France. The Quartet has also won the Gold Medal at the 1978 Portsmouth and Bordeaux Competitions and First Prizes at the Budapest International String Quartet Competition in 1978 and the Bratislava Competition in 1981. The Quartet made its North American debut tour in 1982. Violinist Edward Dusinberre joined the Quartet in 1993 and violist Roger Tapping in 1995. Of the original ensemble, violinist Károly Schranz and cellist András Fejér remain. Violist Geraldine Walther replaced Mr. Tapping in August, 2005. In addition to its residency at the University of Colorado, the ensemble is also a Resident Quartet at the Aspen Music Festival and School, and in 2005, its members were named Associate Artists of the South Bank Center in London. In 2001, The Takács Quartet was awarded the Order of Merit of the Knight’s Cross of the Republic of Hungary.