14 September 2020 - audiences and critics have responded enthusiastically to our Phantasy programme in the three concerts we've performed in our tour to date.

Tim Jones, reviewing our Christchurch concert said of the Beethoven 'Rasumovsky' No 1 "The Aroha Quartet made the most of all the effects and beauties of the four movements, with many telling contrasts of dynamics and articulation impressively communicated."

In his Middle C review of our Lower Hutt performance, Peter Mechen commented "I thought this concert featured a most enterprising programme, a combination of familiar and relatively unfamiliar music, with works for oboe and strings framing two strings-only pieces, providing continual interest and variety for listeners. With each of the concert’s “halves” featuring a shorter, followed by a longer piece, the presentation had an unforced ease of both delivery and reception, the ensemble’s efforts warmly acclaimed at the concert’s end."

Of the final piece in the concert, the Bliss Oboe Quintet, Peter Mechen said " I thought the playing was fantastic in its focused energies, and the brilliance of Robert Orr’s florid figurations at the piece’s end was jaw-dropping! What a great companion-piece this was for the Britten work at the concert’s beginning, and how resounding a success the concert was in its entirety!"

There are four concerts left in the tour: 15 October in Motueka, 18 October in Arrowtown, 1 November in Wellington and 22 November in Kerikeri.