Diogenes Quartet

Biography

The Diogenes Quartet (Stefan Kirpal/Violin, Gundula Kirpal/Violin, Alba González i Becerra/Viola and Stephen Ristau/Cello) is one of the most respected German string quartets of our time and can now look back on a concert career spanning more than 25 years.

Regular tours take the Munich-based ensemble throughout Europe and to festivals as far afield as Mexico. The highlight of the 2025/26 concert season will be a tour of Spain. The Diogenes Quartet will perform a Beethoven cycle there, which will continue into the 2026/27 and 2027/28 concert seasons.

The ensembleʼs broad repertoire spans works from the Classical and Romantic periods to the modern era. The quartet enjoys supplementing its “traditional” repertoire with new, unknown compositions from various eras. It is thanks to this curiosity
that the musicians discovered Brahmsʼ contemporary Friedrich Gernsheim, whose work they have been intensively studying for several years. The result of this work is the ongoing complete recording of his string quartets and quintets (cpo), including world premiere recordings. Volume 3 (of 4) will be released in March 2026.

In the summer of 2025, the ensemble launched a new concert format together with Johannes Steck, actor and one of Germanyʼs most renowned audiobook narrators. In the musical-literary ballad evening “Saiten der Seele” (Strings of the Soul), two powerful forms of expression meet on equal footing. Language becomes music—and music begins to tell stories…

The quartetʼs discography is impressive and diverse. In addition to Gernsheimʼs works, the highly acclaimed recording of the complete string quartets by Franz Schubert (Brilliant Classics 2017) and the premiere recording of Max Bruchʼs String Quartet in C minor, Op. Posth. (Brilliant Classics 2016) are particularly noteworthy. The Diogenes Quartet is passionately committed to innovative concert formats and music education.

For example, the year before last, thanks to the federal initiative Neustart Kultur, a unique childrenʼs music theater program, “DʼArtagnan and the Three Musketeers,” was created. The musicians perform both on stage and in concert, telling the famous
story of a deep friendship in a highly imaginative way.

The quartetʼs name honors its long-standing friendship with Rudolph C. Bettschart, the former co-owner of the Swiss publishing house Diogenes.

www.diogenes-quartett.de/
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