Chamber Music for All

Named for the Erinyes (a.k.a. the Furies) from the Greek tragedy Oresteia by Aeschylus, and with roots in Estonia, Lithuania, Greece, the United States, and Finland, the Erinys Quartet was founded in 2018 at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki where they worked closely with cellist Marko Ylönen. Since Autumn 2023 Erinys has been the Nina von Maltzahn String Quartet-in-Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, PA (USA). 

The Erinys Quartet has performed throughout Finland, the rest of Europe, and in the United States. They have been featured at festivals and concert series including Indiana University Summer Music Series (USA), Mimir Chamber Music Festival (Texas, USA), and Festival Groba (Ponteareas, Spain). They have also taken part in the inaugural Dover Quartet Workshop at the Curtis Institute of Music as well as the Professional String Quartet Seminar with the Pacifica Quartet and Atar Arad (Cleveland Quartet) at Indiana University.

At the Bad Tölz International String Quartet Competition in 2023 they were awarded the Audience Prize Award of the City of Bad Tölz, as well as the Esterházy Foundation Special Prize for best interpretation of a Haydn string quartet. Since 2021 Erinys Quartet has been supported by Le Dimore del Quartetto where they are also a part of the European Union-sponsored MERITA platform.

In the 2023-2024 season the Erinys Quartet will present concerts around the world, including the United States, Spain, Austria, and Finland. In addition to their studies at Curtis with the Dover Quartet, Erinys is pursuing a diploma in chamber music at Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía in Madrid, Spain under the tutelage of Professor Günter Pichler (Alban Berg Quartett).

Named one of the greatest string quartets of the last 100 years by BBC Music Magazine and “the next Guarneri Quartet” by the Chicago Tribune, the two-time GRAMMY-nominated Dover Quartet is one of the world’s most in-demand chamber ensembles. The group’s awards include a stunning sweep of all prizes at the 2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition, grand and first prizes at the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition, and prizes at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition. Its honors include the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant, Chamber Music America’s Cleveland Quartet Award, and Lincoln Center’s Hunt Family Award. The members are on faculty at the renowned Curtis Institute of Music.

The Dover Quartet’s 2025-26 season features collaborative performances with preeminent artists including Marc-André Hamelin and Edgar Meyer, and performances in internationally renowned venues from Carnegie Hall to Kennedy Center to Konzerthaus Berlin. The quartet’s most recent commission is from Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate, a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation and a leading composer of American Indian classical music. His new piece, Abokkoli' Taloowa' (Woodland Songs), is featured on Woodland Songs, the group’s most recent album, which also includes Tate’s new string-quartet orchestration of Rattle Songs by the Indigenous singer Pura Fé, originally for her a cappella vocal group Ulali. Dvořák’s “American” Quartet, a classic of the repertoire, completes the album, released in August 2025 on the Curtis Studio label.

Recent collaborators of the ensemble include Leif Ove Andsnes, Emanuel Ax, Inon Barnatan, Ray Chen, Anthony McGill, the Pavel Haas Quartet, Roomful of Teeth, and Davóne Tines. The quartet has also recently premiered works by Mason Bates, Steven Mackey, Marc Neikrug, and Chris Rogerson.

The Dover Quartet’s highly acclaimed three-volume recording, Beethoven Complete String Quartets (Cedille Records), was hailed as “meticulously balanced, technically clean-as-a-whistle and intonationally immaculate” (The Strad). Other discography highlights are Encores (Brooklyn Classical), a recording of 10 popular movements from the string quartet repertoire; The Schumann Quartets (Azica Records), which was nominated for a GRAMMY for Best Chamber Music/Small Ensemble Performance; Voices of Defiance: 1943, 1944, 1945 (Cedille Records); and an all-Mozart debut recording (Cedille Records), featuring Michael Tree, the late, long-time violist of the Guarneri Quartet. The quartet’s recording of Steven Mackey’s theatrical-musical work Memoir was released on Bridge Records in 2024.

The Dover Quartet draws from the lineage of the distinguished Guarneri, Cleveland, and Vermeer quartets. Its members studied at Curtis Institute of Music, Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, New England Conservatory, and Conservatoire Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. They were mentored extensively by Shmuel Ashkenasi, James Dunham, Norman Fischer, Kenneth Goldsmith, Joseph Silverstein, Arnold Steinhardt, Michael Tree, and Peter Wiley. The Dover Quartet was formed at Curtis in 2008; its name pays tribute to Dover Beach by fellow Curtis alumnus Samuel Barber.

Acclaimed as an “outstanding ensemble…cohesive yet full of temperament” (The New York Times), the Verona Quartet has firmly established itself amongst the most distinguished ensembles on the chamber music scene today. The group’s singular sense of purpose earned them Chamber Music America’s coveted 2020 Cleveland Quartet Award, and a reputation for its “bold interpretive strength, robust characterization and commanding resonance” (Calgary Herald). The Quartet serves on the faculty of the Oberlin College and Conservatory as the Quartet-in-Residence. In addition to its position at Oberlin, the Quartet recently held residencies at Nova Scotia’s Lunenburg Academy of Music Performance, North Carolina’s Chamber Orchestra of the Triangle and the ENCORE Chamber Music Institute. As committed advocates of diverse programming, the Verona Quartet curated the UpClose Chamber Music Series on behalf of the COT, electrifying audiences with their “sensational, powerhouse performance[s]” (Classical Voice America). 

The Verona Quartet has appeared across four continents, captivating audiences at venues such as Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center (New York City), Kennedy Center, Library of Congress, the Smithsonian Institution (Washington, D.C.), Jordan Hall (Boston), Wigmore Hall (U.K.) and Melbourne Recital Hall (Australia), and has performed at festivals including La Jolla Summerfest, Chamber Music Northwest, Caramoor, the Texas Music Festival, Bravo! Vail, and with the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center.

In the 2023-24 season, the Verona Quartet will debut at numerous prestigious series across the US and Canada including Clarion Concerts, the Chicago Chamber Music Society, La Jolla Athenaeum, the Hawaii Chamber Music Society, and Music Toronto, among others. The Quartet returns to Honolulu Chamber Music Series, Eureka Chamber Music Series, University of Southern California, and the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, and in the spring will embark on its first tour across England. In the summer of 2024, the Quartet looks forward to returning to the Encore Chamber Music Institute and giving their debut at the esteemed Santa Fe Chamber Music Festival.

A string quartet for the 21st century, the Verona Quartet champions the rich breadth of the string quartet repertoire from the time-honored canon through contemporary classics. Notable commissions and premieres include works by composers Julia Adolphe, Texu Kim and Sebastian Currier as well as Michael Gilbertson’s Pulitzer Prize-nominated Quartet. In 2023, the Quartet celebrated several world premieres including a work for string quartet, yangqin (Chinese dulcimer) and dancer by Cheng Jin Koh, commissioned by The Smithsonian Institution in honor of the centennial of the Freer Gallery of Art.

The Verona Quartet’s recently released second album, SHATTER, debuted at #1 on the Billboard Traditional Classical Chart in July 2023. SHATTER showcases works written for the Verona Quartet by American composers Julia Adolphe and Michael Gilbertson as well as Reena Esmail’s Ragamala, in collaboration with Hindustani vocalist Saili Oak. The Verona Quartet’s debut album, Diffusion, was praised by BBC Music Magazine for its "radiant glow" and Cleveland Classical for the “Verona’s technical precision, expressive freedom, and brilliant, dramatic phrasing”. The Quartet’s third album, comprised of Ligeti’s complete string quartets, will be released in December 2023 with Dynamic Records in celebration of the composer's centennial year.

In addition to promoting contemporary music, the Quartet strives for a dynamic, imaginative approach to collaboration and programming that champions cross-cultural and interdisciplinary enterprises. In upcoming seasons, the Quartet looks forward to collaborations with saxophonist Steven Banks, clarinetist Alexander Fiterstein, pianist Eric Lu, and pipa virtuoso Wu Man. Past projects include a live-performance art installation with artist Ana Prvački, performances with dancers from Brooklyn’s Dance Heginbotham, artistic exchanges with traditional Emirati poets in the UAE, and a collaboration with GRAMMY-winning folk trio I’m With Her.

Continuing in the lineage of their esteemed mentors the Cleveland, Juilliard and Pacifica Quartets, the Verona Quartet’s rapid rise to international prominence was fueled by top prize wins at the Wigmore Hall, Melbourne, M-Prize and Osaka International Chamber Music Competitions, as well as the 2015 Concert Artists Guild Competition.

The ensemble’s “vibrant, intelligent” (TheNew York Times) performances emanate from the spirit of storytelling; the Quartet believes that this transcends genre and therefore the name “Verona” pays tribute to William Shakespeare, one of the greatest storytellers of all time.