Czech Chamber Music Society • Josef Suk Piano Quartet
The Suk Piano Quartet represents a classic combination of instruments, but one that is not encountered as frequently as some others. Their programme shows how two composers with diametrically opposite approaches, Brahms and Fauré, wrote for the piano quartet. They will be joined by Radka Dohnalová to play a quintet by Czech Philharmonic Composer-in-Residence Thomas Adés that is “full of complicated changes that demand the most precise coordination possible”.
Programme
Gabriel Fauré
Piano Quartet No. 1 in C minor, Op. 15
Thomas Adès
Piano Quintet, Op. 20
Johannes Brahms
Piano Quartet No. 1 in G minor, Op. 25
Performers
Josef Suk Piano Quartet
Radim Kresta violin
Eva Krestová viola
Aneta Šudáková cello
Pavel Zemen piano
Radka Dohnalová violin
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Performers
Josef Suk Piano Quartet
Since its founding, the Josef Suk Piano Quartet has appeared on many important stages around the world, including the Prague Spring Festival in 2016 and concerts in Italy, Austria, Spain, Slovakia, Germany, France, and Japan. Violinist Radim Kresta originally established the ensemble in 2007 as a piano trio. With that instrumentation it won a number of prizes at international competitions such as the Johannes Brahms Wettbewerb 2007 (first prize), the Premio Rovere d’Oro 2008 (first prize), and the Val Tidone Music Competitions 2010 (first prize).
The ensemble has been performing as a piano quartet since 2012. In that form, it earned victories at international competitions including the Concorso Salieri-Zinetti 2013 in Verona (first prize) and one of the most prestigious competitions in the field, the 2013 ACM Premio Trio di Trieste (first prize). The group won the Prize of the Czech Chamber Music Society for the best chamber ensemble of the year 2014. The ensemble was nominated twice in a row (2019 and 2020) for the prestigious Classic Prague Awards in the category for Chamber Performance of the Year.
In 2014 and 2015 the quartet recorded two CDs for an Italian label with music by Johannes Brahms, Gustav Mahler, and Gabriel Fauré, and in 2017 they released a new Czech CD on the Supraphon label with the music of Josef Suk and Antonín Dvořák. That CD was honoured as the Disc of the Week on BBC radio 3 (2017) and as one of the Recordings of the Year on MusicWeb International (2018). In the 2019/2020 season, the Josef Suk Piano Quartet was the ensemble-in-residence of the Czech Chamber Music Society of the Czech Philharmonic.
The quartet is named for the violinist Josef Suk (1929–2011), one of the greatest violinists of the 20th century and a great-grandson of Antonín Dvořák. Besides the classical repertoire, the quartet regularly premieres works written for it by such important contemporary composers as Michal Müller, Jean-Luc Darbelay, Max E. Keller, Matteo d’Amico, Jiří Gemrot, and Marta Jiráčková. At its concerts, the ensemble also appears with the instrumentation of a piano trio or a string trio (with the name Josef Suk Trio).
Radka Dohnalová violin