New Zealand String Quartet
The New Zealand String Quartet (est. 1987) is New Zealand’s only full-time string quartet. The current formation of musicians consisting of Helene Pohl (1st violin), Douglas Beilman (2nd violin), Gillian Ansell (viola) and Rolf Gjelsten (cello) was established in 1994.[1]
The Quartet performs more than eighty concerts a year in New Zealand and international locations.[2] Performances include international festivals such as the Festival of the Sound, Parry Sound, Ontario, Music Mountain Summer Chamber Music Festival in Lakeville, Connecticut and the Australian Festival of Chamber Music in Townsville, Queensland. The quartet is also involved in the Nelson Chamber Music Festival in New Zealand and has been the Quartet-in-Residence at Victoria University, Wellington, since 1991.
In 2010, the quartet released the third and final CD of a compilation series of Mendelssohn’s string quartets for Naxos Records.[3] Other CDs have included works by New Zealand composers for Atoll Records[4] and the complete string quartets of Béla Bartók. They have also been recorded by CBC in Canada, ABC in Australia, Deutsche Welle and Radio New Zealand.