The New Zealand String Quartet is renowned for its versatility and has enjoyed collaborating with musicians from all over the globe, in a range of classical, jazz and world music genres. Collaborations with classical musicians and ensembles have included performances with Piers Lane, Kathryn Stott, Martin Roscoe, Peter Nagy, James Campbell, Nobuko Imai, James Dunham, Maria Lambros, Hariolf Schlichtig, Gao Ping, Anton Kuerti, Alexander Lonquich, Peter Cropper, Colin Carr, Frans Helmerson, Christoph Richter, Igor Begelman and Joel Quarrington, the Lafayette, Lindsay, Michelangelo, Prazak, and Goldner quartets, the BBC Scottish Symphony, the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, The Song Company and Voices New Zealand chamber choir.
Equally comfortable outside the realms of classical music, the Quartet has collaborated with jazz greats Mike Nock, Jim Hall, Wayne Marshall and Uri Caine and world music exponents such as Turkey's Omar Farouk Tekbilek, China’s Wu Man and New Zealand's Richard Nunns and Horomona Horo. In 2013/2014 the group undertook a ground-breaking collaboration with the Forbidden City Chamber Orchestra, China's foremost traditional instrument ensemble, touring a programme of seven new works by Chinese and New Zealand composers in both China and New Zealand. In 2017 the Quartet toured New Zealand with Kathryn Stott, improvised on stage with the Royal New Zealand Ballet in Alexander Ekman’s “Cacti” and collaborated with renowned pipa player Wu Man. In 2018 they will perform at the New Zealand Festival in a collaborative performance with NZ taonga pūoro exponent Rob Thorne.
They also work with New Zealand composers and many new works have been commissioned specifically for them. Sometimes collaborative relationships take them across musical or cultural boundaries, often introducing them to new audiences.
Find out more about a selection of these performances below.