Merel Quartet
Biography Merel Quartet
Merel Quartet
These four musicians, with their wide range of expressive means, exude an irresistible enthusiasm.
Praised for their stylistic awareness and versatility, the Merels perform an extensive repertoire spanning three centuries, from Bach’s Art of the Fugue through to contemporary works by such modern masters as Kurtág, Saariaho and Holliger.
This exceptionally communicative quartet, founded in 2002, has received unanimous praise. The “Wiener Zeitung” writes: “This young Zürich ensemble’s music-making is extraordinarily precise and tonally exceedingly well-matched” and the Neue Zürcher Zeitung lauded the Merel Quartet for playing “with utmost expressivity and a subtle sense of form, tone and rhetoric."
The Merel Quartet has performed extensively in Europe in such prestigious venues as the Zürich Tonhalle and Wigmore Hall and in important festivals such as the Salzburger Festspiele, Lucerne Festival, Kunstfest Weimar, the Menuhin Festival in Gstaad and the Ittingen Whitsun Concerts. Known for their vivid performances, the quartet has excited audiences in Italy, France, England, Germany, Poland and the Czech Republic. In addition, the Merel Quartet enjoys collaborations with such artists as Juliane Banse, Ruth Ziesak, Dénes Várjon, Jürg Widmann, Thomas Demenga, the Quatour Ebène and the Quatour Mosaïques.
Frequent live radio performances for Swiss Radio SRF, Radio Suisse Romande as well as German and Italian radio have brought the Merels added recognition. The quartet’s debut album, including works by Schumann, Janacek and award-winning Swiss composer David Phillip Hefti was praised as the “the outstanding CD-Premier of a first-rate quartet” (Neue Zürich Zeitung am Sonntag).
Last year, the quartet released their second CD with works by Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn, again to high acclaim: “Permeated with a feverish intensity, with close attention to detail and exquisitely balanced illumination of the voices…” and “…their sound, agile and transparent, with a wide range of tonal colors, is irresistible.” (Das Orchester)
