Programme:

Shostakovich In Memoriam

Glazunov - Interludium in Stile Antico Move 3 (from 5 Novelettes opus 15)

Rachmaninov - String Quartet No.1

1. Romance
2. Scherzo

Weinberg -  Improvisation and Romance

Shostakovich - Quartet No. 11 Op. 122

Interval

Shostakovich - Two Pieces for String Quartet

1. Elegy
2. Polka

Weinberg - Aria for String Quartet Op. 9

Shostakovich - String Quartet No. 1 in C major

Lucy Russell, violin
Andrew Roberts, violin
Francis Kefford, viola
Ursula Smith, cello

The Fitzwilliam Quartet is delighted to return Wensleydale in 2025, making a contribution to this wonderful series.

The quartet has experienced seismic change over the past year. It has embraced Francis Kefford on viola following the retirement from the ensemble of legendary founding-member, Alan George. After an incredible fifty-eight years with the quartet, Alan leaves behind a cherished legacy. While Alan’s contribution will be sorely missed, the transition provides the quartet with an exciting opportunity to revise, review and reimagine its music-making; honouring its historic traditions of informed, passionate playing, while continuing to add new music and fresh creativity to the core repertoire.

The Fitzwilliam Quartet was founded in 1968 by four Cambridge undergraduates and the group quickly achieved international recognition as a result of the members’ personal friendships with Dmitri Shostakovich and subsequent championing of his string quartets following his death. He entrusted the quartet with the Western premières of the last three, and before long it had become the first quartet outside of the Soviet Union to perform and record all fifteen. These discs, which gained many international awards, secured for the quartet a worldwide concert schedule and a long-term recording contract with Decca. While the Fitzwilliam Quartet’s pre-eminence in the interpretation of these works has persisted, the authority gained has also been put to the service of a diverse list of other composers from the late 17th century to the present day. The quartet has appeared regularly across the UK, Europe, North America, the Middle and Far East, and Southern Africa, and has made many award winning recordings for Decca, Linn, and Divine Art.

A long-term ambition to record Schubert and Beethoven on gut strings, following the success of previous discs on historical instruments, was initiated during the quartet’s 50th anniversary season in 2018, with recordings of Schubert’s late quartets; Beethoven’s Opp.131 and 135 are soon to be released. The quartet continues to champion new works and has helped to bring about the addition of over 60 new works to the repertoire. These range in diversity from a jazz-fusion collaboration, with German saxophonist/composer Uwe Steinmetz and former Turtle Island Quartet violinist Mads Tolling, to quartets and quintets by Ian Stephens, Michael Blake and Liz Dilnot Johnson.

The Fitzwilliam Quartet has enjoyed various residencies over the years: Quartet-in-Residence at York for twelve years, at Warwick for three, at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge, from 1998 to 2020, and at Bucknell (Pennsylvania, USA) from 1978-2016. The quartet’s university work continues at Clare Hall, Cambridge and at St Andrews University, where it has been involved in working with students from the University Opera and Chamber Orchestra. The ensemble is committed to working with amateur musicians, running its own course, Strings in Spring, at St Andrews University, and teaching regularly at Benslow Music near London.

During the 2025/26 season, the Fitzwilliam Quartet will be presenting a series of programmes contrasting works by Beethoven and Shostakovich with works by female composers, Amy Beach, Doreen Carwithen and Charlotte Bray. In so doing, the quartet is celebrating its rich history and carrying forward its traditions.

LUCY RUSSELL (violin) is held in high international regard for her versatility as a violinist. Her work on both modern and period instruments as leader of the Fitzwilliam Quartet has taken her across the world and has encompassed a breadth of repertoire stretching from Purcell to the present day.

Lucy was born in Germany of Scottish/Norwegian origin but has lived mainly in London. She was a Junior Exhibitioner at the Royal Academy of Music, going on to take music degrees at the University of York, where she gave the first British performance of the Norwegian composer Alfred Janson’s violin concerto Forspil, based on Hardanger violin traditions (an instrument she plays – notably in Uwe Steinmetz’s Genesis). While still a student she was invited to play with London Baroque and the English Baroque Soloists, and by the City of London Festival as a solo violinist in their production/recording of Monteverdi’s L’Incoronazione di Poppea, directed by the late Richard Hickox.

She has been a member of the Fitzwilliam since 1988, becoming leader in 1995; with them she has played all over Europe, North America, and South Africa, as well as making recordings for Linn Records, Divine Art Records, the BBC, and various foreign radio stations. She has recorded for Channel Classics, Hyperion, DG, Hännsler, and Decca with other ensembles, having been leader of Florilegium, Concerto Caledonia, Classical Opera Company, Retrospect Ensemble, the Finchcocks Quartet, The King’s Consort, Dunedin Consort as well as a director of the Scottish Early Music Consort and a solo violinist in the New London Consort. She has been Associate Leader of Southern Sinfonia and has also directed the Danish group Ensemble Zimmerman. A CD set of the complete Bach Obbligato Sonatas, with eminent harpsichordist John Butt was issued by Linn to great acclaim, soon after which she presented a late-night performance of JSB solo Partitas at the Three Choirs Festival in Worcester Cathedral.

Over the past few years, she has been giving recitals with Turkish fortepianist Sezi Seskir in several American Universities, including Cornell and Williams –and lately in the UK. A CD of three of Beethoven’s sonatas, including the much loved “Spring”, was released as a result of their work together.

Lucy has taught and given masterclasses all over the world – including the Czech Republic, the United States, South Africa, Singapore, and Russia. Closer to home, she has worked at the Royal Academy of Music with the Modern Instrument Baroque Orchestra, and at Trinity College of Music, Royal Holloway College London, Fitzwilliam College Cambridge, Birmingham Conservatoire, York University, the Royal Northern College of Music, St Mary’s Music School Edinburgh, Dartington Summer School, and Pro Corda. She is Professor of Baroque Violin at the Royal College of Music and at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire, and Hon Professor of Violin at the University of St Andrews.

She teaches annually as part of the Faculty for Chamber Music Collective which is based alternately at Cornell University and Bucknell University (USA). This is a course primarily focused on period piano collaborations, which is one of Lucy’s specialities. Plans are afoot to record the Brahms violin sonatas using an historical piano, with pianist John Thwaites. Lucy is also a founding Director of the St Andrews Baroque Summer School which attracts participants from all over the world.

She divides her time between performing on period instruments and their “modern” counterparts, exploring music from Monteverdi to the present day. Her passion for deepening the physical experience of playing the violin – through Mindfulness (she is a qualified teacher), both enables her own ongoing journey as a violinist and musician and benefits the students she teaches.

Lucy plays on a violin by Ferdinando Gagliano, made in Naples, Italy, in c1789, a School of Albani violin for baroque repertoire and a unique painted violin by Roger Hansell.

www.lucyrussell.co.uk

ANDREW ROBERTS (violin) has been known to the Fitzwilliam players for many years – and first teamed up with them in July 2019, taking part in a performance of the Mendelssohn Octet, and thereafter as second violinist during the periods before, during, and after the various Covid lockdowns. Andrew comes from a highly distinguished dynasty: his father was the great pianist Bernard Roberts, and his brother Nicholas is cellist of the Coull Quartet; for over fifteen years they played together in the Bernard Roberts Piano Trio, releasing recordings of music by Frank Bridge and Stephen Dodgson to critical acclaim.

A founder of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and long-time member of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, he is equally at home in the 'modern' and the ‘historically informed’ musical worlds. An experienced chamber musician, he was a member of the Auriol Quartet, and has been a guest of many ensembles such as the Dante and Salomon Quartets, Lontano, and Hausmusik, and also has an ongoing duo partnership with pianist Rachel Fryer.

Andrew was delighted to have been appointed as second violin in the Fitzwilliam; and, despite all the months of inactivity, his new colleagues were no less thrilled when he agreed to become a member of the quartet in May 2021.

FRANCIS KEFFORD (viola), born in Australia, has enjoyed a diverse musical career as a chamber musician, teacher, festival director and orchestral musician. He graduated from the Purcell School, London with the Guivier String Prize; then as the Jennifer and Robert Diamond Scholar at the Royal College of Music where he was awarded the Lionel Tertis and Cecil Aronowitz Prizes for Viola.

After studying in Toronto with Steven Dann, his most affecting musical influence, Francis remained in Canada for two seasons as Acting Principal Violist of the Canadian Opera Company. In the UK, Francis is a frequent performer with the Orchestra of the Royal Opera House and he has led the viola sections of the Philharmonia Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, the RTE Concert Orchestra, Ireland, and the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra.

Francis also performs regularly with the UK’s pre-eminent chamber orchestras, including Britten Sinfonia, Aurora Orchestra and the London Mozart Players.

Francis is Co-Director of the Saronic Chamber Music Festival, an annual chamber music festival in Greece, where he has helped to develop a culture dedicated to deep exploration of the repertory in ensembles based as much in profound friendship as in committed artistry. Here, and at other chamber music festivals across Europe – Whittington International Music Festival, UK, Fejøs Festival, Denmark, and the O/Modernt Festival, Stockholm – Francis has collaborated with some of the finest musicians of his generation. He studied chamber music with Levon Chilingirian OBE, and David Takeno in London, and with Mikhail Kopelman, formerly of the Borodin Quartet, in Spain.

He has performed chamber music in many of Europe’s most prestigious venues, including at the Musikverein in Vienna, and at the Wigmore Hall in London. Francis is a faculty member at Zodiac Music Festival and Academy, France, where he teaches viola and chamber music. Francis is a passionate music educator.

In 2007, Francis premièred Elegie – a work for viola and string orchestra by the late, great Australian composer, Peter Sculthorpe – at the International Viola Congress held that year in Adelaide, Australia.

Francis plays a viola by Rodolpho Fredi (Rome, 1931).

www.saronicfestival.com

URSULA SMITH (cello) is an established international chamber musician who has played at events including the Cheltenham, Edinburgh, Aldeburgh, Schleswig-Holstein and Salzburg festivals, and has collaborated with musicians including Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Steven Isserlis, Heinz Holliger, Marieke Blankestijn and Malcolm Martineau. She has been a member of the Fitzwilliam Quartet since 2023 and is a Professor of Cello and Chamber Music at Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London.

She was a Fulbright Scholar at Yale University where she gained a Masters Degree and her teachers have included Ralph Kirshbaum and Aldo Parisot, and at Prussia Cove, György Kurtág and András Schiff. She regularly takes part in Open Chamber Music at Prussia Cove and in 2024 was part of the Open Chamber Music tour, culminating in the Wigmore Hall and collaborating with Janos Palojtay and Pablo Hernan Bernardi. She also plays with the Rossetti Ensemble, championing neglected works from the piano quartet repertoire- a future recording of works by Chausson and D’Indy is planned. At the invitation of the double bass player Leon Bosch, she regularly takes part in projects of the I Musicanti Ensemble, the latest a recording of chamber music by neglected composers Godfrey and Walthew with pianist Peter Donohoe.

She was a member of the Zehetmair Quartet from 2006 to 2012 and played in many of the world’s most prestigious venues, including the Berlin Philharmonie, Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw, Wigmore Hall and Carnegie Hall. The Quartet’s recording of Bartók’s Fifth Quartet won the chamber music Diapason d’Or of the year in 2007. The quartet performed as part of Elliott Carter’s 100th birthday celebrations at the 92Y in New York. Other chamber music discs include the complete Beethoven folk songs for piano trio and voice with pianist Malcolm Martineau for Deutsche Grammophon. At the invitation of Lukas Hagen, she was a jury member of the International Mozart Competition for String Quartets in Salzburg in 2014 and was on the jury of the Banff International String Quartet Competition in 2019.

As a soloist, she has performed with conductors including Andrew Litton, Jorma Panula and Mark Wigglesworth, and she gave the UK premiere of Nigel Osborne’s Cello Concerto.

She was Principal Cello of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra for a decade from 1993 and has guest led the cello sections of the Academy of St -Martin’s-in -the- Fields, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra.

www.ursulasmithcello.com