At home in Germany, the Esmé Quartet is one of the most dynamic and multi-faceted string quartets of its generation, winning audiences and reviewers over with its infectious energy and immaculate ensemble playing. The ensemble won the first prize and four special prizes, including the Mozart and the Beethoven Prize, at the 2018 International String Quartet Competition at London’s Wigmore Hall: a sensational launch of an international string quartet career.

This great success in competition also proved the springboard for worldwide concert activities, ranging from the USA to Europe’s great musical centres and all the way to Asia, where they were celebrated during a prestigious residency at Seoul’s Lotte Concert Hall during the past season. Furthermore, innumerable concert tours and guest appearances have taken the Esme Quartet to festivals and concert halls such as the Lucerne Festival, the Verbier Festival, the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, London’s Wigmore Hall, the Flagey Musiq3 Festival in Brussels, L’Auditori in Barcelona, Teatro La Fenice in Venice, the Heidelberg String Quartet Fest and Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie. In the summer of 2018, they were also the Quartet in Residence at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence.

In 2019, the Esme Quartet became HSBC Winner of the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, also taking first prize at the 55th Possehl Music Prize in Lubeck. Its debut CD, featuring works by Ludwig van Beethoven, Unsuk Chin and Frank Bridge and released in early 2020 by Alpha Classics, won a 5-star review from Diapason d’Or and was named one of the best classical albums of 2020 by WQXR Radio in New York. In October of that year, the Esme Quartet also received the Hans Gal Prize of the German Academy of Sciences and Literature in Mainz and the Villa Musica Foundation.

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