Endellion String Quartet - Dvorak/Smetana/Martinu - String Works (2005)

The Endellion String Quartet, also sometimes known as the Endellion Quartet, is one of Britain's most durable, popular, and critically acclaimed chamber ensembles, with a large discography and a history of performances reaching into many countries. The group has influenced later generations of chamber players in Britain and the U.S. through a series of extended educational residencies.

The Endellion String Quartet, named for the village of St. Endellion in the Cornwall region, was formed in 1979. Its original members were violinists Andrew Watkinson and Louise Williams, violist Garfield Jackson, and cellist David Waterman. The group has been remarkably stable, with the replacement of Williams by Ralph de Souza in 1986 having been its only membership change. In 1991, the quartet began a residency at Cambridge University, still continuing as of 2020, and it has given recurring performances at The Venue Leeds and Balliol College, Oxford. The Endellion String Quartet has also held three short-term residencies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, was Associate Quartet at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, and in 2011, began a run as Visiting Quartet in Association with the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London. A Best Chamber Ensemble Award from the Royal Philharmonic Society in 1996 enhanced the quartet's reputation as a touring attraction, and since then, the group has appeared at many major venues, including Carnegie Hall in New York, Queen Elizabeth Hall in London, and the Amsterdam Concertgebouw.

The Endellion's recording career began in 1990 with an album of Mozart string quartets on the Virgin Classics label. The group has also recorded for CRD and increasingly often Warner Classics, where its cycle of Beethoven quartets appeared. In 2020, some of the quartet's members joined members of the Dante Quartet for a recording of the string quintets of Charles Villiers Stanford on the Somm label. © James Manheim