Juilliard String Quartet

William Schuman, then president of New York’s Juilliard School, established the Juilliard String Quartet in 1946. Its first members included violinists Robert Mann and Robert Koff, violist Raphael Hillyer, and cellist Arthur Winograd. Although the lineup evolved across the years, the ensemble maintained its position among the world’s most celebrated and esteemed string quartets after more than five decades of concerts and recordings.

The quartet originated from a commitment to dedicated performances of new music and a renewed engagement with the traditional quartet canon. In 1947 Schuman submitted a proposal to the Juilliard board for a resident ensemble that would, in his words, “embrace the entire repertoire of music,” with the sole requirement that its name remain fixed irrespective of personnel. Early concerts drew immediate acclaim, as reviewers praised the players’ vigorous, energetic style and the commanding force of every appearance. Later notices continued to highlight the group’s intensity while also noting its “homogeneity” and “secure” sound, qualities often attributed to its extended and distinguished record.

The quartet earned recognition for treating twentieth-century scores and earlier masterworks with equal seriousness, presenting works by Beethoven, Mozart, Haydn, and Brahms alongside those of Bartók, Berg, Schoenberg, and Shostakovich. It became especially identified with the complete Beethoven string-quartet cycle and gained further distinction as a leading advocate for contemporary American music by introducing, on average, at least one new piece annually. Its American repertoire encompasses compositions by Elliot Carter, Aaron Copland, Roger Sessions, and Milton Babbitt.

The ensemble serves as quartet-in-residence at Juilliard, at the Library of Congress since 1962, and at Michigan State University since 1977. Beyond performance, its members act as advocates for modern music and as faculty at Juilliard, where they have mentored numerous ensembles including the Emerson, Tokyo, La Salle, and Lark quartets. The group has appeared throughout the world and became the first American string quartet to tour the Soviet Union, doing so in 1961.

Its recorded catalog contains the complete Beethoven quartets, the Mendelssohn quartets, and quartets by Haydn, Verdi, Schubert, and Sibelius, together with the Mozart and Brahms quintets. Additional recordings feature music by Schoenberg, Webern, Beach, Barber, Carter, Smetana, Gould, Franck, and many other modern composers. For these releases the quartet has received four Grammy awards, a German Record Critics lifetime achievement award, Musical America’s Musician of the Year honor in 1996, and induction into the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame.