Végh Quartet

Personnel

The personnel from 1940 to 1978 were:

In 1978 Philipp Naegele replaced Sándor Zöldy, and Bruno Giuranna replaced Georges Janzer.

Origins

Sándor Végh, a pupil of Jenő Hubay and Zoltán Kodály at Budapest Academy, led the Hungarian Quartet from its foundation in 1935 until 1937, when he ceded the first violin desk to Zoltán Székely, and went to the second in the place of Péter Szervánsky: Denes Koromzay was the viola and Vilmos Palotai the 'cello. Székely was a friend of Béla Bartók, and the group became rapidly known by giving the premiere performance of the Bartók 5th Quartet, which it studied with the composer. By 1938, the group had been heard in every major city of Western Europe. In 1940 Végh left to found his own quartet.

The Vegh Quartet was founded in Budapest and was based there during the War, but left Hungary in 1946 and settled in Paris. They won the Grand Prix at Geneva at its first international music festival 1946.The 1952 recording of the Beethoven quartets was made in Boston, Massachusetts. The personnel of the quartet remained the same for almost 40 years. Then, in 1978 the second violin and viola left the group. (The original violist, Georges Janzer, and his wife, cellist Eva Czako, went on to teach at the Indiana University School of Music, alongside Czako's childhood teacher, János Starker. The Janzers also made a number of recordings of chamber music with the legendary Belgian violinist Arthur Grumiaux.) They were both replaced, but after two more years the ensemble was disbanded.

In 1958, the Quartet completed an acclaimed tour of Southern Africa

Recordings

(*These reissued in a joint remastering by Dr John Duffy & Andrew Rose, October 2008, for Pristine Audio, PACM061. Personnel: Végh, Zöldy, Janzer, Szabo. See [2])