Arditti Quartet

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The Arditti Quartet is an internationally acclaimed string quartet founded in 1974.

The quartet is particularly associated with contemporary music, and have given hundreds of first performances. It has given world premieres of music by Christophe Bertrand, Harrison Birtwistle, John Cage, Elliott Carter, Brian Ferneyhough, Sofia Gubaidulina, György Ligeti, Conlon Nancarrow, Martin Smolka, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Kjell Perder and Iannis Xenakis.

[edit] Members

Irvine Arditti (violin)
Ashot Sarkissjan (violin)
Ralf Ehlers (viola)
Lucas Fels (cello)

Notes on members: Irvine Arditti founded the quartet when he was a student at the Royal Academy of Music. Ashot Sarkissjan joined the quartet in June 2005, replacing Graeme Jennings who was second violinist from 1994-2005. Previous Second Violinists have included David Alberman (1985-1994), Alexander Balanescu (1983-1985) and Lennox Mackenzie (1974-1983).Ralf Ehlers joined the Arditti in January 2003, replacing Dov Scheindlin who was Violist from 1998-2002. Prior to him, the violist was Garth Knox [(1990-1997) and Levine Andrade (1974-1990). Rohan de Saram was the cellist of the group from 1977, but branched out on his own in December 2005, to be replaced by Lucas Fels. The original cellist was John Senter (1974-1976), followed by Helen Liebmann (1976-1977).