The Pacifica String Quartet

Recognized for its virtuosity, exuberant performance style, and daring repertory choices, the Pacifica Quartet has carved out a compelling musical path. Since the ensemble first came together in 1994, it quickly swept top prizes in several leading international competitions, including the 1998 Naumburg Chamber Music Competition. In 2002 the Pacifica was appointed to Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center’s CMS Two program for gifted young musicians, and it was further honored with Chamber Music America’s coveted Cleveland Quartet Award. In May 2006 the Pacifica received a prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant, only the second chamber music ensemble ever to be selected.

The Pacifica Quartet tours extensively throughout the United States, Europe, and the Far East. It can also be heard on many of the nation’s most prominent radio broadcasts, including Chicago’s WFMT, National Public Radio’s Performance Today, and Minnesota Public Radio’s St. Paul Sunday. In the 2005-2006 season, the Pacifica embarked on a European tour that included a re-engagement at Wigmore Hall in London and debut appearances in Brussels and Stuttgart. Two concerts in New York’s Lincoln Center highlighted U.S. touring engagements, which included performances across the country from Boston to New Orleans to Tucson. The Pacifica collaborated with a number of distinguished artists during the season, including the Emerson and St. Lawrence string quartets and pianists Menahem Pressler, Wu Han, and Ursula Oppens.

Prolific in the recording studio, the Pacifica Quartet recently released Declarations: Music Between the Wars showcasing music composed by Leos Janacek, Paul Hindemith, and America’s Ruth Crawford Seeger during the turbulent 1920s and 1930s. The Quartet’s earlier recordings of the complete string quartets of Felix Mendelssohn have been praised by critics in the US and abroad. The April 2006 edition of Gramophone magazine featured the Pacifica on its cover and described it as "one of the finest and most energetic quartets of the younger generation.”

The Pacifica Quartet is an ardent advocate of contemporary music, commissioning and performing as many as eight new works a year. It has championed Elliott Carter’s string quartets and has distinguished itself in performances of the complete cycle of five Carter quartets in New York, San Francisco, Chicago, and Cleveland, and abroad in Japan, Germany, and the Edinburgh International Festival. The New York Times wrote glowingly of the “astounding performances” and the Chicago Tribune praised the Quartet’s “astonishing talent, energy, and dedication.” Through its affiliation with Contempo, one of the country’s leading contemporary music organizations, the Quartet presents a series of concerts each year devoted to new music.

The members of the Pacifica Quartet live in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where they were appointed to the faculty of the University of Illinois in 2004 and serve as Faculty Quartet in Residence. Reflecting their dedication to musicians and music lovers of the next generation, they are frequently invited to visiting residencies at universities nationwide, and they teach and perform at summer festivals, including Fontana Chamber Arts, Music in the Vineyards, Interlochen Arts Camp, and the Madeline Island Music Festival. They are also resident performing artists at University of Chicago and the Longy School in Boston. The Quartet was instrumental in creating the Music Integration Project, an innovative program that provides musical performances and teacher training to inner-city elementary schools.

The members of the Pacifica Quartet share a history of personal and musical friendship. First violinist Simin Ganatra, cellist Brandon Vamos, and violinist Sibbi Bernhardsson played together while they were all teenagers. Sibbi later introduced his friend violist Masumi Rostad to the group. Originating on the West Coast, the Quartet takes its name from the awe-inspiring Pacific Ocean. Throughout their journey as a string quartet, its members strive to be Distinct as the billows/yet one as the sea (James Montgomery).
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