The Maxwell Quartet consists of four close friends (Colin Scobie, George Smith, Elliott Perks and Duncan Strachan) who grew up playing classical and folk music together in youth orchestras and music schools across Scotland. The group officially began in 2010 at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, where its founding members met as postgraduate students. The very next year, the Quartet was appointed as the Conservatoire’s Young Artists in Residence and selected for Enterprise Music Scotland’s Residency Programme.

In 2014, the line-up changed to include Colin Scobie and Elliott Perks on violin and viola respectively. Since then, the Quartet has developed a unique, fresh and genuine voice of its own in the world of chamber music. In 2017, the Quartet received the First Prize and Audience Prize at the Trondheim International Chamber Music Competition, and their performances were hailed as ‘superb storytelling by four great communicators’ by The Strad and as ‘brilliantly fresh, unexpected and exhilarating’ by The Herald.

Now based across the UK and touring regularly in Europe and the United States, the Quartet’s performances are set apart by the tribute they pay to their Scottish folk music heritage. From 2019 to 2021, the Quartet is Associate Artist at both the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland and the Music at Paxton festival.

Always keen to take the possibilities of the string quartet in new directions, the Quartet has worked with musicians including Kari Kriikku, Jonathan Kelly, Benjamin Grosvenor, David Watkin, Anna Meredith, Herman Kolgen, Lunir and the Danish String Quartet. The Quartet has studied with Hatto Beyerle of the Alban Berg Quartett and members of the Endellion String Quartet.