Formed in 1995 at the Fiesole School of Music, the Klimt Quartet is now one of Italy’s most active chamber ensembles. It participates in prestigious festivals in Italy and abroad. Since 1997, the quartet has attended advanced courses held by the Milan Trio in Fiesole; from 2000 it has studied for several years with M° Pier Narciso Masi. In April 1998 the quartet won the first prize at the International Chamber Music Competition “Gaetano Zinetti” Sanguinetto in the Verona province.
A few months after its founding, the quartet was invited by the “Encontre Internationale des Enseignements Artistiques” organized by the Institute de le Marionette in Charleville-Meziéres (France), the Festival dell’Orchestra Giovanile Italiana in Aosta, the “Ater Festival” in Rimini and the “Elba Isola Musicale d’Europa” Festival. The following years the Klimt played in prestigious seasons such as “Lingotto Musica” in Turin, Ravenna Festival, the Ravello Festival, “Musica Insieme” in Bologna and “Bologna Festival,” the Venice Biennale, the Amici della Musica in Florence, the Amici della Musica in Perugia, the Accademia Filarmonica Romana, the Serate Musicali in Milan, and the Mozart Festival in Rovereto; it was also featured in numerous live television and radio broadcasts by RAI, RadioTelevisione Italiana. During these years of intense activity, the Klimt Quartet has been enriched by the advice and support of such artists as Carlo Maria Giulini, Natalia Gutman, Krisztof Penderecki (whose Sextet it premiered in Italy), Maurizio Pollini; the latter invited the Klimt to perform during the award ceremony of “A Life in Music” 1999 in Venice, and gave it the “Arturo Benedetti Michelangeli” scholarship in 2001. In April 2001 the quartet opened the first edition of “I Concerti del Quirinale” in Rome; in July 2001 it was invited to the prestigious Oleg Kagan Musikfest in Kreuth (Germany) and by the Santander Festival (Spain).
In 2010 the prestigious magazine Amadeus published Robert Schumann’s two quartets for piano and strings performed by the Klimt Quartet, which was invited by RAI to perform these pieces live, on Euroradio. In 2011 the quartet was invited by Columbia University in New York; in March 2012 a new CD was released for Amadeus, featuring the two quartets by Antonin Dvořák; in 2014 Stradivarius released the world premiere recording of Morton Feldman’s “Piano, violin, viola and cello,” which was an extraordinary critical success. Also of note is the complete wорks by Mendelssohn for Brilliant Classics, published in 2020.
Always attentive to the promotion of contemporary music, the Klimt is a dedicatee of pieces by composers such as A. Solbiati, F. Antonioni, M. D’Amico, I. Vandor, G. Cardini, G. Gaslini. The quartet’s four musicians teach тчеир instrumentс, quartet and chamber music at the Fiesole School of Music, and since 2012 they have been invited to give international chamber music masterclasses at the Livorno Music Festival. Since 2021, the quartet’s cellist has been Jacopo Di Tonno.