In July 2006, the four women of the Lafayette String Quartet celebrated 20 years of making music together!

Artists-in-Residence at the University of Victoria's School of Music in British Columbia since 1991, their dedication and skill have played a major role in building one of the finest music schools in Canada. Students from all over North America are attracted to the Lafayette's widely respected coaching and teaching skills.

Formed in Detroit, Michigan, the Lafayette String Quartet has, from its beginning combined the two disciplines of performing and teaching to sustain them as artists. With the support of the Ford Motor Co. and a Chamber Music American Residency Grant, they taught for several years in Detroit, where they shared their enthusiasm and love of music with young students at the Center for Creative Studies - Institute of Music and Dance as well as at Oakland University in Rochester, Mi.

Early in the Quartet's career, they garnered major competition prizes, including the Portsmouth International String Quartet Competition and the Grand Prize at the Fischoff National Chamber Music Competition, and embarked on extensive study with chamber musicians of international stature: two years with the Cleveland Quartet at the Eastman School as winners of the Cleveland Quartet Competition, coaching with members of the Amadeus and Alban Berg Quartets, and long-term musical coaching from their mentor, the late Rostislav Dubinsky, former primarius of the Borodin Quartet.

In 1988 the Quartet was described by Musical America magazine as "Young Artists to Watch", and has provided ample proof of the astuteness of that choice. Defying the odds in the demanding world of string quartets, the four women of the Lafayette Quartet have stayed together and flourished artistically for over 20 years.

In the 2000-2001 season they offered the Victoria audience the entire Beethoven Cycle in a six-concert series. They have since performed the cycle in Waterloo, Ontario and in Winnipeg, Manitoba.

In addition to their affinity for Beethoven, the Lafayette Quartet enjoys performing music from all eras of the vast output of quartet literature. Commissioned in celebration of their 20th anniversary, the LSQ will be performing R. Murray Shafer's 11th String Quartet in many of their spring programs. Their CD "Death and the Maiden" on the CBC label (featuring that great work of Franz Schubert as well as the quartets of Fanny Mendelssohn-Hensel and Rebecca Clarke), was awarded the 2003 Western Canadian Music Award for Outstanding Classical Recording and their recordings on the Dorian and AdLar labels have received universal critical acclaim.

The Quartet has had the privilege of collaborating with numerous wonderful artists from all over North America and Europe. This year alone, they are performing with Luba Edlina, James Campbell, Flavio Varani, Yariv Aloni, Paula Kiffner and Gary Karr.

The Lafayette String Quartet is the subject of the author David Round's book "The Four and the One", published in 1998.