BIOGRAPHY The Zelkova Quartet was founded at the Royal Northern College of Music under the guidance of Petr CONWAY Prause, cellist of the Talich Quartet, in 2010. They recently completed an International Artist Diploma in Chamber Music, the institution’s most advanced level of study in performance, and were recently HALL selected to participate in the St John’s Smith Square Young Artists Programme 2014/15. SUNDAY

Recent performances include recitals at St Martin in the Fields, St John’s Smith Square, Moscow’s CONCERTS Rachmaninov Hall and the Bridgewater Hall for the Manchester Midday Concert Society. The quartet have been heard numerous times on BBC Radio 3 including a Royal Philharmonic Society ‘Encore’ performance at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival, a performance as part of the BBC Proms Plus Portrait series and a live broadcast on the ‘In Tune’ programme. They were also one of four quartets selected Patrons internationally to participate in the Trondheim International String Quartet Academy 2012 and attended - Stephen Hough, Laura Ponsonby AGSM, Prunella Scales the Britten Pears Young Artist Programme in September 2013. Future engagements include a series of CBE, Roderick Swanston, Hiro Takenouchi and Timothy West CBE concerts at the Edinburgh Fringe this summer as part of the Royal Overseas League’s programme of events. Artistic Director - Simon Callaghan

Competition successes include winning the Elias Fawcett Trust Prize for Outstanding Chamber Ensemble at the 2014 Royal Overseas League Competition and the RNCM Christopher Rowland Chamber Ensemble of the Year 2012 prize, where the quartet received both First prize and the Audience Prize. They were also awarded the RNCM /Laurence Turner Memorial Prize for String Quartet Sunday October 18th 2015, 6:30pm in the same year and have won numerous other internal competitions.

As an ensemble they have received coaching from Gabor Takacs-Nagy, Levon Chilingirian, Hatto Beyerle, Peter Cropper, Richard Ireland and Christoph Richter. The quartet value the importance of musical education and enjoy teaching on Pro Corda and Ingestre, both chamber music courses for young musicians. The quartet wish to thank both Philip Carne and Peter and Veronica Lofthouse for their support. ZELKOVA QUARTET NEXT AT CONWAY HALL Sunday October 25th 2015, 6.30pm PRIMROSE PIANO QUARTET VIOLIN CAROLINE PETHER Pre-concert Talk at 5:30pm Roderick Swanston VIOLIN CASSANDRA HAMILTON ‘Light into Darkness’ VIOLA ALEX MITCHELL Main Recital at 6:30pm CELLO JONATHAN PETHER Beethoven Q u i n t e t i n E fl a t O p . 16 (a r r. B e e t h o ven) Chausson Quartet in A Op. 30 Brahms Quartet in C minor Op. 60

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Conway Hall Sunday Concerts are an integral part of the charitable activities of Conway Hall. Please turn off all mobile phones and electronic devices. Conway Hall’s registered charity name is Conway Hall Ethical Society (n o . 1156033). No recording and photographing allowed at any time. PROGRAMME PROGRAMME NOTES BEETHOVEN QUARTET IN G OP. 18/2 (1798-1800) Of the Op. 18 string quartets, this one is the most grounded in 18th-century musical tradition. According to Steinberg, “In German-speaking countries, the graceful curve of the first violin’s opening phrase has earned the work the nickname of Komplimentier-Quartett, which might be translated as ‘quartet of (1770-1827) bows and curtseys’.” The nickname may have originated from one of Haydn’s last string quartets written QUARTET IN G OP. 18/2 (1798-1800) about the same time (Op. 77, No. 1; 1799), which was also known as the Komplimentier-Quartett. Haydn was Beethoven’s teacher at the time, and there are similarities in style between the two quartets. I. Allegro They are also both in the key of G major. II. Adagio cantabile - Allegro - Tempo I After he finished the quartet, Beethoven was not satisfied with the second movement and wrote a III. Scherzo: Allegro replacement. Sketches of the original slow movement survive and a complete version has been IV. Finale: Allegro molto reconstructed by musicologist Barry Cooper. It was performed publicly, possibly for the first time, by the Quatuor Danel at the University of Manchester, on 30 September 2011.

HAYDN QUARTET IN D OP. 64/5 (1790) Franz Josef Haydn (1732-1809) The six string quartets, Op. 64, were the last he wrote while composing for Prince Esterhazy. While QUARTET IN D OP. 64/5 (1790) completing them, Haydn was granted a pension and the freedom to travel abroad to London where he was adored as the greatest living international composer. There, Haydn composed and performed I. Allegro moderato for an entirely new public setting. The Op. 64 quartets can therefore be considered the last he wrote II. Adagio cantabile for the traditional chamber music setting characterized by intimacy and nuance; Haydn’s final quartets were composed with the London concerts in mind, and the music shows a corresponding shift in style III. Menuetto: Allegretto towards grander public effects. Each of the Op. 64 quartets demonstrates Haydn’s mature mastery of IV. Finale: Vivace the medium he practically invented. The String Quartet, Op. 64 No. 5 in D is probably the most popular of Haydn’s eighty-three string quartets, its familiarity engendering two different nicknames. The first violin’s singing melody in the first movement inspired the most common title, The Lark. The perpetually lively tempo and upbeat mood of the finale suggested its alternate name, The Hornpipe, an association with it debut performances INTERVAL in England. Although each of Haydn’s quartets is unique in character and construction, The Lark is a perfect representative of the entire genre. Like the majority of string quartets throughout the history ( ) 15 mins of the form, its four movements provide a superior entertainment in four acts aptly described by Paul Epstein as “a story, a song, a dance and a party”.

BRAHMS QUARTET IN A MINOR OP. 51/2 (1873) (1833-97) QUARTET IN A MINOR OP. 51/2 (1873) Johannes Brahms’ first two string quartets, the two works of Op. 51, were released for public consumption in 1873. These are not actually his first efforts in the genre - we know that he tried his hand at well I. Allegro non troppo over a dozen string quartets as a younger man (none of which met with his approval and all of which II. Andante moderato were eventually scrapped) - and yet, Brahms spent the better part of a decade working on Op. 51. We know that Op. 51/1, in C minor was begun all the way back in 1865, and while the date that Brahms III. Quasi minuetto: Moderato - Allegretto vivace began incubating material, privately or on paper, for the String Quartet No. 2 in A minor, Op. 51/2, is IV. Finale: Allegro non assai less clear, it is unlikely that he would spend eight years on Op. 51/1, and then dash Op. 51/2, off in a matter of days. If he did work on them simultaneously for any great length of time, the achievement becomes perhaps even greater, for the two works are really as different from one another as night and day. The C minor work is as rhythmically compact, note efficient, and, in its outer movements, forward- driven as anything Brahms ever wrote. The A minor quartet, which Brahms dedicated to his friend the Viennese surgeon and amateur string player Theodor Billroth, is, on the other hand, composed along Tonight’s performance will finish at approximately 8:15pm. altogether more lyric lines (but by no means less dramatic lines).