The Maier Quartet

The Maier Quartet was formed in 2018 and consists of musicians from the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. They are named after Swedish composer Amanda Maier-Röntgen (1853–94). The Maier Quartet will begin this concert with a rarity – Ludwig van Beethoven’s short Fugue for string quartet on a theme from Handel’s overture from the opera Solomon. This brightly flowing music is by a young Beethoven who has already shown his musical brilliance.

Dame Ethel Smyth is considered among the great classical composers to the very greatest extent. She studied at the conservatory in Leipzig where she met Dvorák, Tchaikovsky and Grieg. But she found the teaching there to be inferior and began studying privately with Heinrich von Herzogenberg. Through him she met Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms. Over time, Ethel Smyth became a notable cultural personality both as a composer and as a leader of the suffragette movement, and she was appointed Dame of the British Empire. Here, we will get to hear her expressive String Quartet in C-Minor (1881).

The conclusion and high point will be Amanda Maier-Röntgen’s string quartet, of which the Maier Quartet gave the world premiere just a year or so ago. People had known of the score for about 20 years, but it was incomplete. Composer and conductor B. Tommy Andersson completed the quartet fully in the spirit of Amanda Maier-Röntgen and it can now be performed in its entirety – which never happened in her own lifetime. The project was paid for by the Friends of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra.

Members of the Maier Quartet are Johannes Lörstad and Patrik Swedrup, violin; Arne Stenlund, viola; and Klas Gagge, cello.