Shanghai Quartet

The group was formed in 1983 at the Shanghai Conservatory in China. In 1984 the quartet was selected by the Ministry of Culture (China) to compete at the Portsmouth International Quartet Competition in England where they won 2nd prize. The group then left China in 1985 to study at Northern Illinois University with the Vermeer Quartet until 1987. In 1989 they became the quartet-in-residence at the University of Richmond. They then were established as artists-in-residency at the John J. Cali School of Music at Montclair State University in New Jersey where they are currently located. A documentary film by Hal Rifken, titled Behind the Strings, was released in 2020, telling the adventuresome history of the musicians through their westward journeys out of the Cultural Revolution in China to their current lives on stage and at home in the US. ==Members==

Weigang Li Weigang Li is a native of Shanghai and began studying the violin at age five under the instruction of his parents. He began formal music education at the Shanghai Conservatory when he was 14 years old. In 1981 he studied at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music through an exchange program with the Shanghai Conservatory. Upon finishing his studies in 1985, Weigang became an assistant violin professor at Shanghai. He then left China to study at Northern Illinois University. From 1987 to 1989, he studied at the Juilliard School and was a teaching assistant to the Juilliard String Quartet. Weigang has been the first violinist for the Shanghai Quartet since its inception. Angelo Xiang Yu Angelo Xiang Yu was born in Inner Mongolia China and grew up in Shanghai. His early musical training was with violinist Qing Zheng at the Shanghai Conservatory. His first major international award was First Prize in the 2010 Yehudi Menuhin International Violin Competition. He is the recipient of a 2019 Avery Fisher Career Grant and a 2019 Lincoln Center Emerging Artist Award. Yu received his Bachelor's and Master's degrees and an Artist Diploma from the New England Conservatory. His teachers include Donald Weilerstein and Miriam Fried. Mr. Yu was chosen to be a member of the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center's The Bowers Program, joining in the fall of 2018. Honggang Li Honggang Li began his musical studies playing the violin like his brother Weigang, and formed the quartet with him He first attended the Beijing Conservatory and then the Shanghai Conservatory where he became a faculty member in 1984. Later in the United States, he became a teaching assistant at the Juilliard School in New York City. Honggang has been a soloist with the Shanghai Philharmonic and the Shanghai Conservatory Orchestra. In 1987 he was given a prize at the Premio Paolo Borciani Competition in Italy by Elisa Pegreffi. ==Discography==