Silesian Quartet
The Silesian String Quartet is one of Eastern Europe's most renowned and durable chamber ensembles, with a strong commitment to contemporary music. Of the 300 works in its repertory, almost two-thirds are by composers of the 20th century or later, and the group has premiered more than 100 works.
The Silesian String Quartet, sometimes billed simply as the Silesian Quartet, was formed in Katowice, Poland, in 1978. Its members were recent graduates of the Karol Szymanowski University of Music there. The quartet's current memers are violinists Szymon Krzeszowiec and Arkadiusz Kubica, violist Lukasz Syrnicki, and cellist Piotr Janosik. The quartet took master classes with members of the LaSalle Quartet and the Amadeus, Juilliard, Smetana, and Alban Berg String Quartets. The Silesian String Quartet quickly gained attention; composer Andrzej Krzanowski dedicated his 1978 String Quartet No. 2 to the group, and one of the quartet's earliest recordings was devoted to that work. Prizes at the Contemporary Music Competition in Krakow and at the 1981 Poznan Music Spring festival spread the quartet's name in Poland, and it became known there in the liberalizing atmosphere of the 1980s as a group that championed Polish contemporary music. In 1994, the quartet recorded an album of chamber music by Henryk Górecki on the Olympia label, and it has continued to record a good deal of Polish music for various labels, including CD Accord, EMI, and Chandos.
The Silesian String Quartet also plays traditional repertory from the 18th to the early 20th centuries, and the group has toured widely across Europe, the Americas, East Asia, and Israel, appearing at New York's Carnegie Hall, London's Wigmore Hall, and the Salle Pleyel in Paris, among many other prestigious venues. Its collaborators have included clarinetist Martin Fröst, pianist Bruno Canino, and contralto Ewa Podleś. Since the mid-2000s decade, the Silesian String Quartet has been supported by the government of Gliwice, Poland, and has collaborated with the city's Music Theater. As of the early 2020s, the group had given more than 1,000 concerts. The Silesian String Quartet recorded prolifically in the late 2010s and early 2020s, making albums on CD Accord devoted to quartets of Mieczyslaw Weinberg (spelled in the Polish fashion, Wajnberg) and on Chandos, where the group issued the complete string quartets of Grazyna Bacewicz in 2016 as well as those of Krzysztof Penderecki in 2021.
© James Manheim /TiVo
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Discography
17 album(s) • Sorted by Bestseller
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Penderecki: Complete Quartets
Silesian Quartet, Piotr Szymyslik
Quartets - Released by Chandos on 3 Sep 2021
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: String Quartets Nos. 2-4
Silesian Quartet, Szymon Krzeszowiec, Arkadiusz Kubica, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 18 Mar 2022
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: String Quartets Nos. 1, 16 & 17
Silesian Quartet, Szymon Krzeszowiec, Arkadiusz Kubica, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 23 Apr 2021
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: String Quartet No. 7 & Piano Quintet
Silesian Quartet, Piotr Sałajczyk
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 7 Apr 2017
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Mieczysław Wajnberg: String Quartets Nos. 5-6
Silesian Quartet, Szymon Krzeszowiec, Arkadiusz Kubica, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 2 Dec 2022
24-Bit 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: String Quartets Nos. 8-10
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 2 Feb 2018
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: 3 Palms & String Quartets Nos. 14 & 15
Silesian Quartet, Joanna Freszel, Szymon Krzeszowiec, Arkadiusz Kubica, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 13 Mar 2020
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Weinberg: String Quartets Nos. 11-13
Silesian Quartet, Szymon Krzeszowiec, Arkadiusz Kubica, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 19 Apr 2019
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Bacewicz : Piano Quintets, Quartet for 4 Violins...
Chamber Music - Released by Chandos on 1 Apr 2018
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Wolpe: Quartets - Cantata
Hanns Eisler New Music Group, Cornelia Kallisch, Silesian Quartet
Chamber Music - Released by CPO on 1 Nov 1997
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Quatuors à cordes
Silesian Quartet, Marek Andrysek, Roman Widaszek
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 4 Sep 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Knapik - Chamber Works
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 24 Mar 2023
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Krzysztof Meyer: Piano Quartet, Op. 112 & Piano Quintet, Op. 76
Szymon Krzeszowiec, Silesian Quartet, Łukasz Syrnicki, Piotr Janosik, Piotr Sałajczyk
Chamber Music - Released by Naxos on 7 Aug 2015
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo -
Bacewicz: Two Piano Quintets, Quartet for Four Violins & Quartet for Four Cellos
Silesian Quartet, Polish Cello Quartet, Wojciech Switala, Krzysztof Lasoń, Małgorzata Wasiucionek
Chamber Music - Released by Chandos on 1 Apr 2018
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
3 x 4 + 8
Silesian Quartet, Arkadiusz Adamski, Warsaw Cellonet Group, Thomasz Hajda, Stanislaw Lason, Piotr Salajczyk
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 6 Nov 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Polish Piano Quintets
Silesian Quartet, Eugeniusz Knapik, Zygmunt Krauze, Piotr Sałajczyk, Tymoteusz Bies
Chamber Music - Released by CD Accord on 22 Mar 2024
24-Bit 96.0 kHz - Stereo