Renowned for its passionate musicality, impressive technique, and multicultural innovations, the Shanghai Quartet (Weigang Li and Yi-Wen Jiang, violin; Honggang Li, viola; Nicholas Tzavaras, cello) has become one of the world’s foremost chamber ensembles. Its elegant style melds the delicacy of Eastern music with the emotional breadth of Western repertoire, allowing it to traverse musical genres from traditional Chinese folk music and masterpieces of Western music to cutting-edge contemporary works.
Formed at the Shanghai Conservatory in 1983, the Shanghai Quartet has worked with the world’s most distinguished artists and regularly tours the major music centers of Europe, North America, and Asia. Recent performances have ranged from the International Music Festivals of Seoul and Beijing to the Festival Pablo Casals in France, Terra Magica Festival in Croatia, Yerevan Festival in Armenia, and Cartagena International Music Festival in Colombia as well as numerous concerts in all regions of North America. The quartet has appeared at Carnegie Hall in chamber performances and with orchestra and in 2006 gave the premiere of Takuma Itoh’s Concerto for Quartet and Orchestra in Carnegie Hall’s Isaac Stern Auditorium. Among innumerable collaborations with noted artists, they have performed with the Tokyo, Juilliard, and Guarneri Quartets, Yo-Yo Ma, Lynn Harrell, Menahem Pressler, Peter Serkin, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, and Chanticleer.
The Shanghai Quartet has an extensive discography of more than 25 recordings. Releases range from Schumann and Dvořák piano quintets with Rudolf Buchbinder to Zhou Long’s Poems from Tang for string quartet and orchestra with the Singapore Symphony (BIS). Delos released the quartet’s most popular disc, Chinasong, in 2003. The collection of Chinese folk songs features music arranged by Yi-Wen Jiang and reflects his childhood memories of the Chinese Cultural Revolution. The Shanghai Quartet recorded the complete Beethoven String Quartets for Camerata, a seven-disc project that was completed in 2009.
The Shanghai Quartet has participated in a diverse and interesting array of media projects, from a cameo appearance playing Bartok’s String Quartet No. 4 in Woody Allen’s film Melinda and Melinda to PBS television’s Great Performances series. Violinist Weigang Li appeared in the documentary From Mao to Mozart: Isaac Stern in China, and the family of cellist Nicholas Tzavaras was the subject of the 1999 film Music of the Heart starring Meryl Streep.
The Shanghai Quartet has served as quartet-in-residence at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University since 2002 and currently serves as ensemble-in-residence with the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra. They are also currently visiting guest professors of the Shanghai Conservatory and the Central Conservatory in Beijing.
For more information, visit the quartet's website at shanghaiquartet.com.
