Belcea Quartet

In recent seasons the Belcea Quartet has become a regular presence and an audience favorite at Duke Performances. The reason is clear: even after two decades together, raves The Guardian, they “still play like a young quartet, seizing the music’s energy, shocking us out of our seats with every fortissimo.”

The Belcea play two Schubert quartets: the breakthrough Quartet No. 10, written by the sixteen-year-old composer under the tutelage of Salieri; and his epic final quartet, a harmonically daring masterpiece. Between these they have placed one of the towering classics of chamber music, Shostakovich’s Eighth String Quartet. This “musical autobiography,” written in a three-day burst of creativity, quotes from the composer’s previous works to assemble a rich collage of his life’s most significant moments.