Overview
Our story
Overview
Our story
“Those who keep a tradition alive are not those who conform, but rather, they are those who transform”
Robert Gerhard
Our quartet is a story of vital friendship. We have known each other since childhood and we have always shared a passion for playing music and learning.
We grew to realise that playing as a quartet should be the main endeavour of our lives - because our shared dedication, our friendship bond, our love of music and the chemistry between us in doing so were all so strong, and because the differences between our personalities makes our music all the more vivid.
Robert Gerhard was a Catalan composer. He was born in Valls, which is very near our birth place in Catalunya, and he was a pupil of Schoenberg at the beginning of the 20th century. Thanks to Gerhard, people like Webern and Schoenberg himself were regular visitors to Barcelona. One can read in their correspondence how amazed they were by the city and the culture at that time, just before the civil war and fascism killed any progress in Spain.
That's why we took the name of Gerhard, because he was a resolute man; he joined the avant garde movement of that time and he fought for his idea of music in a way we strongly identify with.
bio
bio
Biography
'' The Quartet Gerhard clearly responds to the question why art exists. Its four members commit themselves completely and without ado to their vocation and dedicate themselves with conviction and devotion to serving the best music - including an intelligent choice of contemporary repertoire - to explain, without words, its meaning or, at least, in the best possible conditions offered by the live experience of a concert - to confront us with the mystery of art. ''
- Ramon Humet, composer
The Quartet Gerhard is distinguished for a remarkable sensitivity for sound and for an inner respect for music as the highest link between human beings.
As a quartet, they have their main roots in Basel (Rainer Schmidt), Berlin (Eberhard Feltz), Hannover (Oliver Wille) and they are currently taking part in the chamber music program of the Instituto de Cámara (Günter Pichler) thanks to the scholarship given by Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía . They have also worked with other great personalities such as György Kurtág, András Schiff and Ferenc Rados.
Prize winners of several national and international competitions, they take part in venues such as the Chamber Music Series at the Stadt-Casino Basel (Switzerland), the Bordeaux String Quartet Festival and Radio France Festival Montpellier (France), Elbphilharmonie Hamburg (Germany), the Musikamera series in La Fenice (Italy) the 'Palau de la Música' and Chamber Music Series L’Auditori (Barcelona) and the Muzenforum Concerten Bloemendaal (Holland), among others. It is also remarkable their commitment to music of new creation, appearing in important venues such as the CNDM series in Madrid, Nuit de la Création in Aix-en-Provence and in the series of the Arnold Schoenberg Center in Vienna. From 2023 they are taking part of the Merita Platform which gives them a relevant international projection.
Among other long term projects stands out the String Quartet Academy in Vic (Barcelona), founded by Gerard Claret and Cuarteto Casals. Within this academy they are once per year involved as teachers in the task of conveying the beauty of chamber music making.
Surpassing their early and enthusiastic praise, Quartet Gerhard has shown, beyond all expectation, how talent and perseverance lead to success. The impeccable work of Quartet Gerhard, particularly in the sound, added to the univocal direction they have taken to becoming an established string quartet (something more than four excellent musicians playing together), explains their recognition and reach. With a critically acclaimed debut album under their belt, a good handful of reviews and a calendar of diverse concerts, Gerhard Quartet offers creative programs that are evidently complex and, to a certain extent, complementary. Repertoires aimed at taking deeper breaths from an already common, shared source. Their poetry expressed in that which is strictly musical but also in that which encases it, mature beneath the presentation of these new programs. A path that forges ahead, towards its own horizon.
Their performances have been broadcasted by Catalunya Radio and RNE (Spain), NDR and SWR (Germany) on a regular basis. Among their discography we can find the CD-Album ‘Portrait’, supported by the new label Seed Music (Spain, 2016), a release with music by Kurtag, Schumann and Berg by Harmonia Mundi International and the CD Ad Astra with works by Debussy & Ramon Humet by Klarthe (2023). They also have been part of the documentary “Revolutionary Quartet. L’enigma Gerhard” by Xavier Bosch & Josep Badell, winner of the prestigious INEDIT prize 2023.
NEW PROJECT: "In memory of beauty"
NEW PROJECT: "In memory of beauty"
“In memory of beauty”
photo by Josep Badell
The Quartet Gerhard presents a program that reflects on the two major colliding forces that weave through history: the act of creation and the act of destruction. Art as a reflection of the human gaze—a gaze that, at times, lingers on the sublime, but so often desperately contemplates the abyss. This program calls to memory, to recollection as a catalyst for that which the human spirit yearns for. The harmonies and counterpoint of Bach, foundations of four-voices music, the infinite lament of Shostakovich through one of his most emblematic works, and, finally, a hymn to hope with Tchaikovsky's colossal and luminous quartet—a work of great expressiveness where the quartet emphasizes its sound and personality.
Bach, selection of “Art of the Fugue”- 10’
Shostakovich, string quartet nº8 op.110 c minor - 26’
Tchaikovsky, string quartet nº1 op.11 d major - 32’
[There is a promotional video that the quartet has not released out of respect for the current wartime situation.]
Praise follie
Praise follie
“Praise of follie”
Edgar Degas
This proposal arises from a desire to understand how extreme experiences can impact us. We focus on emotions as a key element in the face of complex psychological processes. Using a program that blends separate movements, we explore the shadows of the soul and desire.
Bach Choral C Major - Bartók n.6 (III. Mesto - Burletta) - Schumann op.51/3 (Adagio) - Schubert “Erlkonig” - Schubert quartet n.15 (III.) - Janácek quartet n.1 (III.) - Alban Berg Lyric Suite (IV.) - Shostakovich quartet n.10 (II.) - Schubert n.14 (II.) - Tchaikovsky quartet n.1 (II.) - Beethoven op.135 (IV.)
sound of color
sound of color
“Sound of color”
Claude Monet
The two most representative French string quartets, gathered in a single program. Debussy and Ravel, great exponents at the beginning of the 20th century, wrote two enormous works for quartet that show a new look at timbral, harmonic and melodic processes. Two works that lead the definitive transformation of music, pushing it into new sound areas.