Navarra Quartet & Fiachra Garvey

String Quartet / Piano

Date & Time: Friday 19th May 2023, 8pm
Venue: The Saloon, Russborough House
Ticket Info: Tickets €38 / €19 student concession
(+ booking fee)
Artists: Benjamin Marquise Gilmore / violin
Bartosz Woroch / violin
Sascha Bota / viola
Brian O’Kane / cello
Fiachra Garvey / piano
Programme: Mozart String Quartet No.15 in D minor, K.421
Jane O’Leary Beneath the Dark Blue Waves (world premiere)
Brahms Piano Quintet in F minor, Op.34

The dynamic Navarra Quartet team up with acclaimed pianist Fiachra Garvey for a programme including Brahms' powerful Piano Quintet.

The London based Navarra Quartet has built an international reputation as one of the most dynamic and poetic string quartets of today.

With regular appearances at major venues throughout the world including Wigmore Hall, Sydney Opera House and the Lincoln Centre filling up their diary, we’re thrilled that the Navarra Quartet will join us at Russborough for a performance that also features Wicklow pianist and the festival’s artistic director, Fiachra Garvey.

With Mozart’s beautiful and unrelentingly dramatic String Quartet in D minor kicking-off proceedings, together they’ll perform the world premiere of Jane O’Leary’s Beneath the Dark Blue Waves and Brahms' brooding and brilliant masterpiece, the Piano Quintet in F minor.

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“The players realize the music’s essential intensity with their vivid sense of dramatic expression in an intensely detailed performance.”
BBC Music Magazine

Taking its name from a bottle of red from the wine region famously known for its multi-coloured landscapes, the Quartet’s diverse cultural backgrounds are united in serving the music with relentless passion and commitment.

Recent highlights included chamber music at the Lammermuir Festival, and performances in Ireland, Holland, Tenerife and across the UK. In 2022, the Navarra Quartet also celebrate their 20th anniversary, with the release of the complete Mozart quartets dedicated to Haydn, new commissions, and tours to Europe, the USA, and Australia. Previous appearances at major venues throughout the world include the Amsterdam Concertgebouw, Luxembourg Philharmonie, Berlin Konzerthaus, Queen Elizabeth Hall, King’s Place, Sydney Opera House and international festivals such as Lockenhaus, Verbier, Aix-en-Provence, Grachten, Schwetzinger, Heidelberg, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and the BBC Proms. The quartet has also toured extensively to Russia, the USA, China, South Korea and the Middle East.

Navarra String Quartet enjoys sharing the stage with a variety of partners such as Tom Poster, Mark Simpson, Francesco Piemontesi, Guy Johnston, Allan Clayton among others, and their friends the Castalian and Elias Quartets. Beyond the versatile repertoire from di Lasso to Kurtág, the quartet finds collaborating with contemporary composers highly nourishing. New commissions by Simon Rowland-Jones, Joseph Phibbs and Mauricio Hidalgo are dedicated to the Navarra Quartet and featured in eclectically crafted programmes along Beethoven and his contemporaries.

Highly-acclaimed recordings include Joseph Haydn’s The Seven Last Words for Altara Records and a disc of Pēteris Vasks’ first three String Quartets for Challenge Records, which was recorded whilst working closely with the composer himself. The disc was described by critics as “stunning”, “sensational” and “compelling”, and was nominated for the prestigious German Schallplattenkritik Award.

Selected for representation by the Young Classical Artists Trust (YCAT) in 2006, the Navarra String Quartet is a winner of the MIDEM Classique Young Artist Award, a Borletti-Buitoni Trust Fellowship and top prizes at the Banff, Melbourne and Florence International String Quartet Competitions. In 2017, the prestigious Kersjes Prize in the Netherlands was awarded to the quartet, enabling the creation of many exciting and unique programmes.

Navarra String Quartet's website

Wicklow-born pianist Fiachra Garvey is possessed of a maturity and profound understanding of his art, which when combined with his infectious enthusiasm for music-making, has already captivated audiences in concert halls across Europe and beyond.First prizewinner at the 2012 Jaques Samuel Competition, London, Fiachra Garvey, ARAM, has performed in venues from the Fazioli Auditorium in Italy to London’s Wigmore Hall. He has also been a prizewinner at AXA Dublin International Piano Competition (Brennan Prize and McCullough Bursary), EU Piano Competition Prague (concerto finalist), and 3rd Soirees-Concours Internationales de Piano a Collioure, France (Audience award).

The National Concert Hall Dublin awarded Fiachra the “Rising Star” prize in 2011, which subsequently led to a series of concerto and solo debuts.Fiachra’s concerto appearances include Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini with the Janáček Philharmonic, Tchaikovsky and Poulenc with the RTÉ National Symphony Orchestra and Cambridge Symphony Orchestra, Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue and Grieg with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra, Prokofiev No. 3 with the RIAM Symphony Orchestra and Grieg with the Hibernian Orchestra, working with eminent conductors including John Wilson, Duncan Ward, Theodore Kuchar, Stephen Bell and Mihhail Gerts.

Recent highlights include the first classical recital at Google Dublin, a series of solo and two-piano recitals in Japan, a tour of China during which Fiachra gave masterclasses at the Beijing Conservatory of Music, as well as appearances at Spoleto Festival Italy, Wexford Opera, Brighton Festival, West Cork Chamber Music Festival, Bridgewater Hall, Manchester and The Geneva Festival, Switzerland.

Fiachra’s debut CD For the Piano, on the RTÉ lyric FM label “brings a deep and infectious enthusiasm, combined with insight and technical comfort.” (Sunday Times). His second CD is a live performance from Wigmore Hall. Fiachra is the Founder and Artistic Director of the West Wicklow Chamber Music Festival and Co-Founder and Artistic Director of Classical Vauxhall.

He is hugely grateful for the support he has received from the Arts Council (Professional Development Award 2020) and the Wicklow Arts Office (Artist Award Scheme 2020).

When not performing, Fiachra loves nothing more than returning home to help on the family farm with the yearly lambing, dipping, shearing, harvesting and all the other elegant and refined activities on the farm! Fiachra feels this makes him a more inspired and fulfilled musician.