Orford String Quartet
| Company type | String quartet |
|---|---|
| Industry | Music |
| Founded | 1965 |
| Defunct | 1991 |
| Headquarters | Toronto , Canada |
| Products | Concert performances, recordings |
The Orford String Quartet was a prominent Canadian string quartet that operated from 1965 until 1991, widely regarded as Canada's foremost string quartet and celebrated internationally.
Founding
In 1951, Gilles Lefebvre launched a summer music camp for Les Jeunesses Musicales du Canada at Mont-Orford National Park in Quebec. This initiative eventually developed into the Orford Arts Centre, presently known as Orford Music. Violinist and educator Lorand Fenyves, then residing in Geneva, began teaching at the camp in 1963. During the summer of 1965, two Canadians studying under Fenyves—Andrew Dawes and Kenneth Perkins—joined the program and, together with Terence Helmer and Marcel Saint-Cyr, formed a string quartet that gave its first performance on 11 August 1965. After Fenyves accepted a position with the University of Toronto Faculty of Music in autumn 1965, the group moved to Toronto, later forging ties with the university in 1968 and becoming part of its faculty by 1972.
Career
From 1965 to 1967, the quartet toured extensively across Canada for Jeunesses Musicales du Canada, including performances in France and Austria, culminating in their Carnegie Hall premiere on 22 November 1967. Following their affiliation with the University of Toronto, they embarked on numerous tours throughout Canada, delivering over 1,500 concerts, premiering upwards of 50 Canadian compositions, and producing more than 50 recordings. Their United States tour took place in 1984.
In 1974, the Orford Quartet secured first place at a European Broadcasting Union competition for string quartets. They received the Canadian Music Council Award in 1978 for their recordings of Mendelssohn Quartets Nos. 1 and 2; the Grand prix du disque in 1981 for works by Beckwith and Schafer; and again in 1983 for Beethoven quartets.
Their discography earned three Juno Awards for Best Classical Album: Solo or Chamber Ensemble:
- 1985 – Mozart: String Quartets
- 1987 – Schubert Quintet in C featuring Ofra Harnoy
- 1991 – Schafer: Five String Quartets
Both Andrew Dawes and Kenneth Perkins were honored as Members of the Order of Canada in 1991, with Dawes’ leadership acknowledged as instrumental to the quartet’s global stature.
Scholarship fund
The ensemble’s last two concerts occurred in 1991 at Music at Sharon in Sharon, Ontario. The second-to-last concert showcased string quartets by R. Murray Schafer, while their final performance revisited the program from their debut in 1965. Earnings from this concluding concert established a scholarship fund overseen by the Ontario Arts Foundation. Between 1997 and 2012, this fund supported university-level string chamber musicians and currently awards a biennial prize to emerging professional string chamber performers.
Personnel
Source:[1]
- Andrew Dawes, first violin
- Kenneth Perkins, second violin
- Terence Helmer, viola (1965–1986)
- Marcel Saint-Cyr, cello (1965–1980)
- Denis Brott, cello (1980–1988)
- Paul Pulford, cello (substitute, 1988)
- Desmond Hoebig, cello (1989–1991)
- Robert Levine, viola (1986–1987)
- Sophie Renshaw, viola (1987–1991)
Selected discography
- Mozart: String Quartets, Doremi Catalog DHR6601/2
- Schubert: Quintet in C, featuring Ofra Harnoy
- Schafer: Five String Quartets by R. Murray Schafer, with soprano Rosmarie Landrie, Centrediscs CD-CMCCD 39/4090 (1990)
- Beethoven: Complete String Quartets, Delos Catalog DE3039 (1994)
External links
- ↑ Cite error: Invalid
<ref>tag; no text was provided for refs namedtce