This string quartet of outstanding and experienced British chamber musicians was formed in 2019. Their album ‘Howells & Wood Quartets’ (Premiere Recordings) was widely praised: ‘Perfection’ BBC Music Magazine; ‘full of vitality… expertly played’ Fiona Maddocks, The Observer. It was The Gramophone recommended recording 2024 and featured on BBC Radio 3. Their further album of Charles Wood quartets (SOMM), was released at the English Music Festival in 2026.
The LCE Quartet played late Beethoven for the 250th anniversary, Schubert for the Schubert Society of GB and at the Howells and Stanford festival in Cambridge. They opened Kensington & Chelsea Music Society’s season in a sold-out concert with Quartet no.5 by Joseph Horovitz and Brahms Clarinet Quintet which Musical Opinion called ‘superb high-quality chamber music-making’.
In 2024/25 they performed in Music in Country Churches and Pinner Music Festivals, HHH Concerts, and Ludlow Assembly Rooms. They toured in Scotland and Wales and at prestigious events including London’s Glaziers Hall; the US Embassy/Fulbright Commission; the international Red Violin Festival, Leeds; and the Three Choirs Festival 2026.
Madeleine Mitchell won an RPS award for a film of her Anglo-Russian quartet programme with the V&A exhibition Fabergé: Romance to Revolution which included the Borodin String Quartet no.2 (on YouTube). A return invitation followed, again sold out, for their quartet concert ‘French Impressions’ with the V&A Chanel exhibition.
Today, they will play three quartets that navigate an historical and expressive journey across more than a century of chamber music, highlighting the evolution of modern string writing. The Debussy quartet, described by Kathy Henkel of the LA Phil as having ‘attractive melodies and harmonies’ with ‘startlingly beautiful effects’, employs the Aeolian mode with connotations of the wind God. John Whittaker’s quartet ‘In our Times’ is partly inspired by the 14th century effigies ‘The Aldworth Giants’ of Aldworth Church in Berkshire where it was given its premiere in July 2022. The concert concludes with Herbert Howells, quartet No.3, a monumental piece whose sub-title ‘In Gloucestershire’ captures the pastoral beauty of the Cotswolds.
Madeleine Mitchell (violin), Gordon MacKay (violin), Bridget Carey (viola), Joseph Spooner (cello)
Photo: © LCE Quartet