Chamber Music Concerts Opens the 2025-26 Season with the Award-Winning Dover Quartet

“From start to finish, everything was absolutely flawless…The Dover Quartet could play anything for us, and we would ask for more…An amazing, beautiful quartet.” La Presse

Chamber Music Concerts (CMC) opens its 2025-26 season with the Dover String Quartet on Sunday, October 12th at 3pm at the Southern Oregon University Music Recital Hall. Student tickets are just $5, and SOU employees may attend for $10. For discounted tickets, please contact the CMC Box Office at schmidtj@sou.edu or call 541-552-6154. Tickets will also be vailable at the door will student/SOU ID.

CMC’s longtime audience members have been treated to the Dover Quartet many times — it’s one of the most lauded and respected ensembles in the world. Twice nominated for a GRAMMY Award, one of their members is an Ashland native: cellist Camden Shaw was born and raised in Ashland. 

Named one of the greatest string quartets of the last 100 years by BBC Music Magazine and “the next Guarneri Quartet” by the Chicago Tribune, the two-time GRAMMY-nominated Dover Quartet is one of the world’s most in-demand chamber ensembles. The group’s awards include a stunning sweep of all prizes at the 2013 Banff International String Quartet Competition, grand and first prizes at the Fischoff Chamber Music Competition, and prizes at the Wigmore Hall International String Quartet Competition. Its honors include the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant, Chamber Music America’s Cleveland Quartet Award, and Lincoln Center’s Hunt Family Award. The Dover Quartet is the Penelope P. Watkins Ensemble in Residence at the Curtis Institute of Music and Quartet in Residence at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music.

The Dover members studied at the Curtis Institute of Music, Rice University’s Shepherd School of Music, the New England Conservatory, and the Conservatoire Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris. Formed at Curtis in 2008, its name pays tribute to Dover Beach by fellow Curtis alumnus Samuel Barber.

The concert program features Jessie Montgomery’s Strum; Karol Szymanowski’s Quartet no. 1 in C Major, Op. 37; and Felix Mendelssohn’s Quartet no. 6 in F Minor, Op. 80. Don't miss the free pre-concert lecture at 2pm.