Stir Cheat Sheet: 5 facts about the Takács Quartet as it celebrates golden anniversary

Friends of Chamber Music hosts the accomplished group at the Vancouver Playhouse

By Emily Lyth

Takács Quartet. Photo by Amanda Tipton

Friends of Chamber Music presents the Takács Quartet at the Vancouver Playhouse on December 8 at 3 pm

FROM ITS HOME BASE at the foothills of the Rocky Mountains in Boulder, Colorado, the Takács Quartet has solidified a reputation as one of the most acclaimed string ensembles in classical music today.

Violinists Edward Dusinberre and Harumi Rhodes, violist Richard O’Neill, and cellist András Fejér have held prominence over the decades for their masterful interpretations of classic traditions. The four musicians have been artists-in-residence at the University of Colorado Boulder since the ’80s and now run a yearly graduate quartet residency program in collaboration with the school’s string faculty.

Over the decades, the quartet has won such titles as the Wigmore Hall Medal and the Royal Philharmonic Society Award for chamber music and song; recorded several award-winning albums; and toured extensively around the globe.

In an upcoming Friends of Chamber Music show at the Vancouver Playhouse on December 8, the Takács Quartet will perform Haydn’s String Quartet in C major, Op. 54, No. 2, Britten’s String Quartet No. 2 in C major, Op. 36, and Beethoven’s String Quartet No. 16 in F major, Op. 135.

Read on to learn a bit more about the group ahead of its winter concert here.

Takács Quartet. Photo by Ken Jacques

#1

It’s the foursome’s golden anniversary

This season marks the Takács Quartet’s 50th as an ensemble, and that’s no small feat. Cellist Fejér is the only original member who’s still a part of the group, which he co-founded in 1975 with violinists Gabor Takács-Nagy and Károly Schranz and late violist Gabor Ormai when they were all students at the Franz Liszt Academy of Music in Budapest.

#2

The musicians are regulars in the city

The Takács Quartet performs often for Vancouver audiences—in fact, the ensemble’s upcoming Vancouver Playhouse appearance will mark no less than its 27th performance with Friends of Chamber Music since debuting here in 1982. During their most recent concert at the Playhouse in December 2023, the musicians played works by Haydn, Bartók, and Schubert.

#3

Meryl Streep has collaborated with the quartet

At Princeton University in 2014, the Takács performed a program that took inspiration from Philip Roth’s novel Everyman (which starts with an ordinary man’s funeral and then looks back on his memories to tell the story of his life). Streep read out four excerpts from the book, which the quartet paired with pieces by Britten, Shostakovich, Schubert, and contemporary Estonian composer Arvo Pärt. The following year, Streep and the quartet gave an encore performance for a Canadian audience at the Royal Conservatory of Music’s Koerner Hall in Toronto.

#4

The group pays homage to its Hungarian roots

All four original members of the Takács Quartet were born in Hungary, which informed much of the group’s early playing traditions. Though its roster of musicians has changed, that influence is still a common thread in the quartet’s performances; one of its more frequent collaborators is Hungarian folk group Muzsikás.

#5

A new album just dropped

On November 15, the Takács released a recording called Ngwenyama: Flow, a spirited and playful string-quartet work that the members commissioned for contemporary American composer and violist Nokuthula Ngwenyama. The piece draws inspiration from patterns in nature and the cosmos; interestingly, this requires the musicians to go completely against the grain by playing on the other side of their instruments’ bridges (the pieces that transmit string vibrations), which results in totally unique overtones and noise.  

---

Related Articles