News
January 1, 2012
Happy New Year!!! We have uploaded new sound clips on our music page!
December 30, 2011
You can view pictures from our visit to Community Music Works by clicking here!
December 23, 2011
Visit our blog page for some up close and personal (and hilarious) member profiles. 
August 15, 2011
We are very happy to conclude our season with a performance in the beautiful Pollack Hall for the opening night of MISQA. Click here to read a review from the Montreal Gazette.
August 4, 2011
The Cecilia String Quartet is featured on the cover of the German chamber music magazine Ensemble. Click here to visit the Ensemble website.
August 3, 2011
CSQ violinist Min-Jeong Koh and her husband, Afiara Quartet cellist Adrian Fung, were interviewed by Keith Horner at the Festival of the Sound in Parry Sound. Click here to watch the interview.
August 2, 2011
New photos from the Ottawa Chamber Music Festival! Click here.
July 11, 2011
Cecilia Quartet debuts to rave reviews in Bloomington Indiana, at Indiana University’s Auer Hall.
Peter Jacobi, reviewer for Bloomington IN newspaper the Herald-Times, writes that the Cecilia Quartet “has the real goods in craft and musicianship”, and proclaims that the top BISQC winners (the Cecilia and Afiara Quartets) have proven themselves “more than worthy of the honor”.
April 30, 2011
Pictures from our European tour are up on Flickr!
April 11, 2011
The Cecilia String Quartet debuts to great acclaim in Europe. Martin Wilkening, arts critic for the Berliner Zeitung, writes the following about the quartet’s performance at Berlin Konzerthaus on March 31 2011:
Astounding was the musicians’ extreme control of all bizarre mental leaps and insertions dreamed up by Haydn’s imagination. Enchanting was the sensibility towards the sound, the transitions between melodics and harmonics, which ensured that the relationship between the four instruments unfolded to reveal acute presence at all times. Amazing was also the mastery that balanced each individual detail against the general rhythmic flow. Also, in terms of tonal quality, mostly devoid of vibrato and yet intensive, the balance between expressiveness and interplay was almost dauntingly perfect, and the beauty of the tone in the plaintive melodic magic of the slow movement was simply unbeatable.
February 2, 2011
The Cecilia Quartet and Alon Nashman will present Patrick Cardy’s ‘The Snow Queen’ in Ottawa (Feb 18-19) and Vancouver (Feb 24-26). Click the links below for more information:
Ottawa Chamber Music Society
Music in the Morning (Vancouver)
January 29, 2011
The Cecilia Quartet had a nice chat with Jian Ghomeshi at Q. Click here to listen to the interview!
January 28, 2011
The Cecilia Quartet announce a 4 album recording deal with ANALEKTA. First album scheduled to be released Winter 2012.
November 28, 2010
We are on the cover of the The Music Scene Toronto publication of La Scena Musicale!
September 10, 2010
This week, founding cellist of the Cecilia String Quartet, Rebecca Wenham, officially resigned her position with the quartet in order to relocate to California and pursue a number of personal projects. Rebecca departs on a high following the quartet’s success as first Prize winner at the Tenth Banff International String Quartet Competition (BISQC).
Cellist Rachel Desoer will join the Cecilia in Toronto in their new residency as Quartet Fellows at the Glenn Gould School of the Royal Conservatory of Music. The members of the Cecilia Quartet will make their first appearance on stage this season in Toronto as soloists with the Royal Conservatory Orchestra and Maestro Uri Mayer in R. Murray Schafer’s Four Forty at the Koerner Hall as part of Nuit Blanche on October 2nd at 8:00 PM.
Violinist Sarah Nematallah writes: “While we are saddened to lose our friend and colleague Rebecca, we are full of optimism having found Rachel. Rachel comes to the Quartet with a rich history of chamber music experience, and as she studied with many of the same mentors as the rest of the Cecilia, we speak the same musical language.”
Barry Shiffman, Executive Director of BISQC, states: “Changes in personnel are an inevitable reality of quartet life, and it just so happens that the timing of the Cecilia’s change comes after such a momentous win. We are, however, pleased to see such a seamless transition, and are looking forward to working with and supporting the Cecilia Quartet in their career development as part of their first-place win at BISQC.”
The Banff International String Quartet Competition
The Banff International String Quartet Competition first-place prize package includes $25,000 (CDN) and extensive concert tours over three years, a Banff Centre residency including the recording and production of a CD, and a quartet of custom bows by renowned bow maker François Malo. The Competition has also recently created an endowment of over $1.3 million dollars with the generous support of a private gift and federal government matching funds to support an extensive career development program. The Freeze Family Career Development Fund will allow for concert touring support, new music commissioning funds, residency and educational activity, and publicity and communications support, all in support of our BISQC laureates. It is the only such program of its kind in Canada, and dramatically improves the level of support BISQC provides for emerging careers in chamber music.
About Rachel Desoer
Canadian cellist Rachel Desoer has attended the Juilliard School, McGill University and received her Bachelor of Music degree from Oberlin College. Rachel has received many awards and much acclaim through competitions such as the 5th Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra Concerto Competition. Her performing career includes recitals, chamber concerts, recordings and orchestral tours in North America, Europe, Australia and China. She joins the Cecilia Quartet this fall.
September 8, 2010
We have a new instrument in our family, the 1851 Jean Baptiste Vuillaume that was given to Sarah Nematallah from an anonymous donor. Sarah and the quartet would like to thank the anonymous donor for his generosity and support.
September 7, 2010
The Cecilia Quartet has been awarded First Prize and the Canadian Commission Prize at the 2010 Banff International String Quartet Competition (BISQC) at The Banff Centre.
May 16, 2010
The Cecilia Quartet has been awarded the Prix de la Sacem for the best performance of the commissioned work by Gilbert Amy at the 2010 Concours International de Quatuor à Cordes de Bordeaux.
September 24, 2009
Min-Jeong Koh has won the use of the 1767 Joannes Baptista Guadagnini violin from the Canada Council for the Arts Musical Instrument Bank. She and the quartet would like to thank the anonymous donor and the Canada Council for the Arts for their generous support.
Feb 22, 2009
We are very grateful to the ACCR and ProQuartet for generously supporting our Odyssée Residency Project, Breathing Life into Music (BLiM).
