Masterclass with Hill Quartet and Pavel Haas Quartet.

Hill Quartet
Bridget O’Donnell [violin]
David López Ibáñez [violin]
Julia Doukakis [viola]
Ben Michaels [cello]

The Hill Quartet are an innovative, multi-national chamber ensemble based in London. With strong roots in the classical world, they hold a deep interest in expanding the string quartet repertoire by curating, commissioning and performing cross-genre art forms and contemporary music, currently the Royal Academy of Music Chamber Fellows.

With their frequent collaborator, mezzo-soprano Lotte-Betts Dean, the Hill Quartet made their debut live appearance on BBC Radio 3 ‘In Tune’ program in 2020, performing new music by Connor D’Netto. The quartet’s latest commission ‘Winter Blues’ by jazz-bassist Misha Mullov-Abbado was recently premiered at Conway Hall, and their studio recording was released by October House Records in January 2022. Also featured on this album is Mullov-Abbado’s clarinet quintet ‘Three Road Songs’, recorded in collaboration with clarinetist Ben Mellefont.

They are mentored by John Myerscough, cellist of the Doric String Quartet, and have been awarded the Sir John Barbirolli, Dorothy & Marjorie White and Alexander Kelly prizes by the RAM in recognition of their chamber achievements.

Pavel Haas Quartet
Veronika Jarůšková [violin]
Marek Zwiebel [violin]
Luosha Fang [viola]
Peter Jarůšek [cello]

The Pavel Haas Quartet is revered across the globe for its richness of timbre, infectious passion and intuitive rapport. Performing at the world’s most prestigious concert halls and having won five Gramophone and numerous other awards for their recordings, the Quartet are firmly established as one of the world’s foremost chamber ensembles. In spring 2005, the Quartet won the Paolo Borciani competition in Italy. Further highlights early on in their career were the nomination as ECHO Rising Stars in 2007, the participation in the BBC New Generation Artists scheme between 2007-2009 and the Special Ensemble Scholarship the Borletti-Buitoni Trust awarded them in 2010. The Quartet are based in Prague and studied with the late Milan Skampa, the legendary violist of the Smetana Quartet. They take their name from the Czech composer Pavel Haas (1899-1944) who was imprisoned at Theresienstadt in 1941 and tragically died at Auschwitz three years later. His legacy includes three wonderful string quartets.