Cuarteto Arriaga de Banco de España

Established in 1995 at the Reina Sofía School of Music, the Banco de España Arriaga Quartet has studied with Antonello Farulli, Alasdair Tait and Márta Gulyás, among other professors. Its current formation studies under the guidance of Heime Müller, professor of the String Quartets Department. In 2000, the Ensemble was awarded first prize at the International Competition of Granada. It has performed all over Spain and in 2010 Her Majesty Queen Sofía handed the Ensemble the Diploma to the most outstanding Chamber Group in the category of piano groups. Additionally, they have received the same Mention in the string quartet category in 2024.
Since its creation, the Banco de España Arriaga Quartet has attended chamber music masterclasses by Peter Frankl, Walter Levin, Ralf Gothóni, and Hatto Beyerle. It has performed at Torrevieja’s Palacio de la Música, Real Academia de Bellas Artes de San Fernando, Palacio Marqués de Salamanca, the Sony Auditorium, Palacio de la Moncloa and Museo ABC, Distrito Telefónica, Valladolid’s Teatro Calderón, Teatro Real, as well as at the Conservatorio Jesús de Monasterio in Santander.
It has also participated, along with other chamber groups of the School, in the recording of a CD by Sony with works of Beethoven, Hirayoshi, and Mendelssohn (1996) and a CD, under the same label, with Puccini’s Crisantemi (1998). In 1999 the Ensemble recorded Alfred Schnittke’s Quartet no. 3, published in a commemorative CD for the 10th anniversary of the Reina Sofía School in 2002. In 1997 it also released a CD with works of Arriaga and Shostakovich under the name of “Cap Gemini Concerto”.