First prize-winners of the 2021 Royal-Overseas League Chamber Music Competition and of the Philharmonie de Paris's 2020 String Quartet Biennale, the Echéa Quartet are swiftly establishing themselves as an international quartet. Formed at the Royal Academy of Music in 2017, the quartet are currently Chamber Music Fellows at the Royal College of Music. They are artists for the City Music Foundation, Kirckman Concert Society, Tillett Trust and the Worshipful Company of Musicians, and are the 2021/22 recipients of the Hattori Foundation’s Senior Award.
In 2019, the Royal Philharmonic Society awarded them the Albert and Eugenie Frost Prize. The quartet are mentored by John Myerscough (Doric Quartet) and Mathieu Herzog (former Quatuor Ébène), and have close-working relationships with composers György Kurtág and Thomas Adés.
The quartet has appeared at a number of international festivals such as Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Festival de los Siete Lagos, West Cork Festival and IMS Prussia Cove. They have performed in venues such as the Musikverein, Philharmonie de Paris, Musée de L’ Orangerie and Franz Liszt Academy. The quartet have featured live on BBC Radio 3's 'In Tune', and on CBC National Radio (Canada) as part of their six-week tour of the west coast of North America (2019).
Maintaining a footing on the European stage, the quartet is an ensemble for ProQuartet, the European Chamber Music Academy and Le Dimore del Quartetto. Highlights of 2022 include the quartet’s debut at Wigmore Hall and Conway Hall, and appearances at Festival d'Aix-en-Provence, Brighton, SmorgasChord, Newbury and North Norfolk chamber music festivals.