After dedicating over a decade to the string quartet world as the Badke Quartet, they return to Conway Hall as the newly formed Oculi Ensemble. The evening will be centred around the music of Richard Strauss, comparing and contrasting his early chamber works to a sextet from his final opera Capriccio. One of Haydn's final quartets and Brahms's rich and complex String Sextet No 2 complete the programme.
The Oculi Ensemble is a flexible ensemble derived from the internationally award winning Badke Quartet.
Having dedicated 13 years to the quartet repertoire, recording and performing internationally in the worlds finest concert halls,the Badke Quartet are excited and thrilled to start their next musical adventure, The Oculi Ensemble.
Capitalising on their rich history of musical collaborations they have invited some of the finest chamber musicians to join them to form The Oculi Ensemble branching out into larger and smaller combinations from two to eight players.
Members of the Oculi Ensemble hold numerous international prizes as individuals and chamber musicians and have recorded for labels such as Hyperion, Chandos and Champs Hill. The Ensemble also consists of current or previous members of Doric Quartet, Navarra Quartet, Albion, Piatti and Idomeneo Quartets.
Future projects include collaborations with voice, wind and piano and BBC singers where they willexplore the breadth of chamber music written for a flexible ensemble.
The Oculi Ensemble perform on a stunning range of instruments including those from Stradivari, Guarneri and Grancino.
Pre-concert talk | Robert Hugill, 5:30pm in the Brockway Room
From Haydn to Richard Strauss
Robert Hugill puts the music of tonight's concert in context ranging from Haydn's final essays for string quartet, a medium which he virtually invented. Johannes Brahms's second string sextet, a grouping which gained in popularity during the romantic era, and Richard Strauss's journey from his early, perhaps dutiful chamber works to the great masterpiece of the string sextet from his opera Capriccio.