Recognized for its virtuosity, exuberant performance style, and often daring repertory choices, the Pacifica Quartet has carved out a compelling musical path. Recent career highlights include complete Beethoven quartet cycles in Chicago, New York City, California, and Wisconsin; performances in Europe and Japan; and the release of Declarations: Music Between the Wars on the Cedille label.  The release of the first CD in a two-disc set of the complete quartets of Elliott Carter on the Naxos label will coincide with a performance of Carter’s complete quartets at Lincoln Center in January, 2008. In May 2006, the Pacifica Quartet became only the second chamber music ensemble to be awarded a prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant.  Winner of three of chamber music’s most important international awards – Grand Prize at the 1996 Coleman Chamber Music Competition, top prize at the 1997 Concert Artists Guild Competition, and the 1998 Naumburg Chamber Music Award – the Quartet was subsequently honored in 2002 with Chamber Music America’s highly esteemed Cleveland Quartet Award as well as being appointed a member of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s CMS Two program for gifted young musicians.  

 

An ardent advocate of contemporary music, the Pacifica has commissioned and premiered as many as eight new works a year, and has performed Elliott Carter’s five quartets on prestigious stages in the U.S. and Europe.

 

The members of the Pacifica Quartet live in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where they were appointed Faculty Quartet-in-Residence at the University of Illinois.  They are also resident performing artists at the University of Chicago and the Longy School of Music in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Simin Ganatra, violin

Sibbi Bernhardsson, violin

Masumi Per Rostad, viola

Brandon Vamos, cello

 

 

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