The Fine Arts Quartet, “one of the gold-plated names in chamber music” (Washington Post), ranks among the most distinguished ensembles in chamber music today, with an illustrious history of performing success and an extensive legacy of over 200 recorded works. Founded in Chicago in 1946, the Quartet is one of the elite few to have recorded and toured internationally for over three quarters of a century.
The Quartet’s renowned violinists, Ralph Evans (prizewinner in the International Tchaikovsky Competition) and Efim Boico (former concertmaster of the Orchestre de Paris under Barenboim) have performed together for 40 years. They are joined with two eminent musicians: violist Gil Sharon (founder of the Amati Ensemble), and cellist Niklas Schmidt (co-founder of the Trio Fontenay).
Many of the Quartet’s latest releases have been selected for inclusion on Grammy Awards entry lists in the categories “Best Classical Album” and/or “Best Chamber Music Performance” and have received multiple awards and distinctions, among them: “Gramophone award-winner” and “recording of legendary status” (Gramophone Classical Music Guide), “Key Recording/Top Recommendation” (Penguin Guide to Recorded Classical Music), “Editor’s Choice” (Gramophone Magazine), “Critic’s Choice” (American Record Guide) [2 times], BBC Music Magazine Choice”, “Recording of the Year” [3 times] (MusicWeb International), and a Grammy Award for producer Steven Epstein (Fauré Quintets with Cristina Ortiz). The Quartet also received the CMA/ASCAP Award for Adventurous Programming, given jointly by Chamber Music America and the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers. The Quartet’s 3 most recent recordings (Mozart, Enescu, Dvorak) will be released by Naxos in 2023.
The Quartet members have nurtured many of today’s top young international quartets while teaching at the Sorkin International Institute of Chamber Music in Milwaukee and serving as guest professors at major conservatories in Paris, London, New York, Beijing, Hamburg, and music festivals all over the world.
