Quatuor Bozzini at 25: Montreal's String Quartet Democracy

Quatuor Bozzini's story offers insights into how a string quartet can function in the twenty-first century, not merely as performers but as active agents in creating, interpreting, and disseminating new work.

Their artistic approach centers on finding a composer's unique musical fingerprint. As founding member Isabelle Bozzini explains, "We always look for what we call a 'voice.' So, somebody who really has something specific and original." This quest for originality steers them away from what they term "academic music," compositions that may demonstrate technical proficiency but lack distinctiveness or fail to challenge conventions.

This method directly connects to their question: "What is a string quartet in the twenty-first century? And where can you go with a string quartet?" Their questioning of the form shows a commitment to playing chamber music and expanding its possibilities.

Their resistance to academic conformity reveals much about their values. As Isabelle notes, they have "sometimes preferred young, inexperienced artists where we found, 'Oh, there's something special there,' versus a seasoned PhD student where we thought, 'It sounds good, but he knows his orchestration [too] well.'"

Perhaps the most distinctive aspect of Quatuor Bozzini's quarter-century of operations is its organizational structure. Unlike many classical ensembles with designated leaders or artistic directors, Bozzini function as a true collective. Violinist Alissa Cheung, who joined the group in 2014, describes their culture as "super democratic," where "everyone is involved in almost every decision."

This egalitarian model extends beyond artistic choices to encompass administrative responsibilities. The quartet shares tasks related to concert production, touring logistics, and operation of their record label, Collection QB. Clemens Merkel notes, "We have many hats on," while Isabelle explains their philosophy: "I've always said that we're co-directing. I'm officially the artistic director because we have a system of grants, and you have to nominate people. But since the beginning, we've been saying we're co-directing."

The quartet's commitment to this egalitarian structure contrasts traditional chamber music organizations. As Clemens recounts, there's "a phrase of a chamber music teacher a long time ago that, when you play string quartet, you have to leave your personality in the wardrobe," which he dismisses as "not only wrong, [but] stupid because you have to profit the maximum from everybody's personality." Instead, Bozzini operate from the understanding that the whole can become "something better than just the additional four people, that it creates something larger, better, more beautiful."

This idea also applies to their musical interpretation, which often inverts traditional hierarchies. Rather than following the conventional primacy of the first violin, Clemens explains, "For us, everything starts from the bass, like the whole tuning system. Everything starts from the bass, and then it goes up. The first violin is not necessarily the person who leads."

Central to Quatuor Bozzini's artistic practice is their investment in working with living composers. While they don't exclusively perform contemporary works, having played repertoire from Beethoven and Schubert to Karlheinz Stockhausen, they particularly value direct composer collaboration.

These collaborations serve multiple functions. First, they allow for clarification and refinement of the composer's intent. Isabelle explains, "You work on something which is still in process, and you give it an interpretation, and then usually most composers are very interested and helpful around something we see on the page."

Beyond clarification, these collaborations often involve creative dialogue that shapes the final work. The quartet appreciates composers "who accept being challenged," creating an environment where performers have "agency... to collaborate on the outcome." This interest in creative agency also extends to their work with composers who incorporate improvisation or performer choice, such as Christian Wolff and Alvin Lucier, whom Alissa describes as "mavericks."

Personal relationships with composers inform their interpretations in profound ways. As Alissa notes, "Through spending time with them, having dinner, learning their personality, then their music, it just jumps out on the page because you know what they obsess over, their curiosities, the way they speak in language. And so their musical language becomes even more clear to us."

For Quatuor Bozzini, performance spaces become active participants in their artistic expression rather than neutral containers. While they acknowledge the impact of different acoustic environments, they approach these variations with confidence. As Clemens states, "The hall has to adjust to us. We give the hall our sound, and then the hall does with it what it can."

This confidence stems partly from their strong ensemble identity. Isabelle describes how, over time, they have developed "much of our own thing as a group and our own sound, and we feel like we're a sort of accordion quartet or something like this, like we're one instrument."

The quartet finds particular value in touring, offering artistic stimulation and personal enrichment. Alissa describes the experience as "super stimulating," explaining that "changing countries, you change mentality," while the exposure to different artistic communities allows them to become "part of something bigger." These experiences extend beyond formal concert settings, including unexpected cultural encounters, like "eating from the same plate" in an African restaurant.

The musicians also appreciate the focused simplicity of touring life. As Clemens explains, "You have a suitcase, which means you don't have a house or an apartment or anything to take care of... your set of tasks is very limited... rehearsing, traveling, playing concerts." This concentration on essential activities provides a welcome contrast to the administrative complexities of their home operations.

Perhaps most significantly, touring reinforces the quartet's interpersonal bonds. Unlike some chamber groups that maintain professional distance, Bozzini members "still like each other... talk to each other... travel together," as Clemens notes, adding, "Not every string quartet does that." This mutual support creates resilience through challenges: "If you're down, there's always someone who can help you. If someone else is down, you will help that person."

Over their twenty-five-year history, Quatuor Bozzini have maintained consistency in core values while embracing evolution. As Clemens reflects, "Aesthetics and styles change, but mainly ethos and, for us, the way we approach things, how we approach music, how we approach composers... doesn't change."

This continuity exists alongside personnel changes, including the addition of violinist Alissa Cheung in 2014. Such transitions require careful integration, both artistically and organizationally. Alissa describes her introduction to their specialized performance techniques, including "playing microtones, which I'd never done," and using "a machine to tell you that you're right or wrong"—unfamiliar practices that represented "research" for her as a performer.

The quartet's long-term vision also encompasses their recorded legacy, including strategic reissues of significant works. Their recent re-release of Jürg Frey's string quartets (originally recorded in 2003–04) honors this music’s continuing relevance and their own artistic development. As Isabelle notes, they’ve chosen not to reissue some earlier recordings because "we have a very different sound and style now."

Quatuor Bozzini's commitment to expanding the possibilities of string quartet music naturally leads them to technical innovation. Their repertoire frequently demands extended techniques unfamiliar even to accomplished classical players. Alissa's description of her initiation into the quartet—learning to use cork in the strings, mastering unfamiliar plucking skills, and navigating microtonal tuning systems—reveals the adaptability required. By embracing abilities that may initially seem alien to classical tradition, the quartet expands the expressive palette available to composers and creates new possibilities for the medium.

Swiss composer Jürg Frey, whose work features prominently in their discography, typifies this expansive mindset. His "Streichquartett 2" achieves its distinctive sound through "a fingering technique known as half-tone harmonics which blurs both the pitch and colour of each sonority," creating music that "floats on the very brink of audibility." Such facilities transform the string quartet from a vehicle for conventional melodic expression into an instrument capable of exploring the very thresholds of sound perception.

The reality of sustaining an independent contemporary music ensemble requires balancing artistic pursuits with organizational necessities. Clemens notes that their duties extend far beyond rehearsing and performing: "We were in a meeting from 9:30 to 12:40 about a piece of organizational software we are co-developing."

Managing their record label adds another layer of complexity, requiring production, distribution, and promotion skills. Such administrative responsibilities could easily overwhelm the artistic focus, but the quartet has developed strategies to maintain balance, including their work-sharing democracy.

This reality of contemporary arts practice, the "multitude of things we need to do," makes their touring time especially precious as a period when they can focus primarily on music-making. The contrast between administrative demands and pure artistic work creates a rhythm in their professional lives, with each aspect informing and supporting the other.

Quatuor Bozzini offer an example of a successful chamber ensemble and a model for contemporary artistic practice that balances inventiveness with sustainability, individual voice with collective vision, and artistic exploration with organizational resilience.

Their twenty-five-year journey demonstrates that radical artistic choices need not come at the expense of long-term viability. The quartet's philosophy suggests that significant artistic innovations often happen not through solitary genius but through sustained collective effort: a group of committed individuals asking fundamental questions about their art form and developing technical means and organizational structures to explore possible answers. Quatuor Bozzini exemplifies musical excellence and a comprehensive vision of what artistic practice can be in the contemporary world.

Learn more about Quatuor Bozzini at quatuorbozzini.ca and follow the quartet on Bluesky, Facebook, and Instagram. The album Jürg Frey: String Quartets can be purchased from Actuellecd, Bandcamp, or Qobuz. You can also listen on your streaming platform of choice.