Susanne Schäffer, violin
Eszter Kruchió, violin
Sara Marzadori, viola
Bas Jongen, cello
Founded in 2019 on the principles of chaos in the arts, science, and philosophy, the Chaos String Quartet combines a highly refined ensemble culture and a fiery vitality with a passion for exploring experimental and improvisational approaches. With their affinity for embracing unpredictability and risk-taking, the ensemble’s members bring a unique dynamism and vibrancy to their playing featuring a whole universe of sounds.
Recently selected as a BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist 2023-2025, the Chaos String Quartet is rapidly establishing itself on the international music scene. The Quartet has been awarded at the most prestigious international competitions, such as ARD (2022), Bordeaux (2022), Haydn (2023) and Bad Tölz (2023). Additional successes include winning the 2nd Prize at Budapest’s 2021 Bartók World Competition and the Premio V. E. Rimbotti in Italy.
Their newly-released album featuring works by Haydn, Ligeti and Hensel (Solo Musica) was met with international critical acclaim.
The Chaos String Quartet was invited to music festivals such as the Schwetzingen SWR Festival, the Schwarzwald Musikfestival, the Mozartfest Würzburg, Les Musicales de Normandie, the Davos Festival, the Ravenna Festival, the Festival del Quartetto Firenze, Lockenhaus, the Gent Festival van Vlaanderen, the Festival Academy Budapest, and the Heidelberger Streichquartettfest, among others. In the season 2023-24, the ensemble made its debut at the Musikverein in Vienna, the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, Philharmonie de Paris and BOZAR in Brussels.
Mentored by Prof. Johannes Meissl in Vienna through the ECMAster program, the quartet additionally completed a postgraduate course at the Scuola di Musica di Fiesole with the Cuarteto Casals. The ensemble received additional important musical impulses from artists such as Eberhard Feltz, Patrick Jüdt, Rainer Schmidt, Hatto Beyerle, András Keller and Oliver Wille.
The group has worked with artists like Nicolas Baldeyrou, Alexander Ullman, Giampaolo Bandini, Reinhard Latzko, Avri Levitan, Hyung-ki Joo, Christoph Zimper, as well as the Modigliani, Signum, Amaryllis and Barbican Quartets. In addition, the group had the opportunity to work with composer Helmut Lachenmann on his 2nd quartet, “Reigen seliger Geister”.
Next to their classical concert career, the quartet enjoys developing interdisciplinary projects and new concert formats in order to make the quartet repertoire more approachable and open it up to a more diverse audience.
The ensemble is a member of the MERITA Project and has been selected for the promotional program “New Austrian Sound of Music”.
Susanne Schäffer plays a violin by Carlo Giuseppe Testore (c. 1710), kindly on loan from the MERITO String Instruments Trust and Bas Jongen plays a cello by Hendrick Jacobs (Amsterdam, 1696), kindly loaned to him by the Dutch Musical Instruments Foundation (NMF).
