Beaches Fine Arts Series continues its 54th season of free concerts with a performance by the Czech Bennewitz String Quartet with Russian pianist Arsentiy Kharitonov at 4 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 8, at St. Paul’s by the Sea Episcopal Church in Jacksonville Beach. A reception follows in the newly renovated parish hall with an art exhibit by Mary Jone Hinson.
For more information, go to https://beachesfinearts.org/bennewitz-quartet-and-arsentiy-kharitonov.
Bennewitz Quartet
The Bennewitz Quartet is one of the leading international chamber ensembles, a status confirmed by its victories in two prestigious competitions — the Osaka International Chamber Music Competition in 2005 and the Premio Paolo Borciani in Italy in 2008 — but also by widespread critical acclaim.
In 2004, the quartet was awarded the Prize of the Czech Chamber Music Society, and in 2019 the four musicians received a Classic Prague Award for the Best Chamber Music Performance of the year. The quartet performs regularly at major venues in the Czech Republic and beyond. The ensemble has collaborated with several distinguished artists.
The Bennewitz Quartet has always placed particular emphasis on its activities within the Czech music scene. Highlights have included a collaboration with the Czech Philharmonic and its then chief conductor Jiří Bělohlávek in Bohuslav Martinů’s Concerto for String Quartet and Orchestra. The quartet has also recorded both string quartets by Leoš Janáček for Czech Television in the unique setting of Villa Tugendhat in Brno. Czech Radio regularly records the ensemble’s major concert appearances.
The members of the quartet attach great importance to creating imaginative and sometimes demanding concert programs. In 2012 and 2015, the ensemble performed all six of Bartók’s string quartets in a single evening, at the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino and in Uppsala, Sweden. In 2014, the quartet gave the premiere of Slavomír Hořínka’s Songs of Immigrants at the Konzerthaus Berlin. In 2019, the ensemble released a new recording for the Supraphon label featuring works by persecuted Jewish composers Hans Krása, Viktor Ullmann, Erwin Schulhoff and Pavel Haas.
Highlights of the 2026-27 season will include debuts at the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C., at the Warsaw Philharmonic, as well as in Helsinki and Lyon. In Germany, the quartet will return to the Liederhalle in Stuttgart and the Mozartfest Würzburg. The ensemble will continue its collaboration with Veronika Hagen and will join the Mandelring Quartett and the Aris Quartett for a complete cycle of Beethoven’s string quartets.
Arsentiy Kharitonov
Hailing from St. Petersburg, Arsentiy Kharitonov is the first-prize winner of the Franz Liszt International Piano Competition (US). After also winning the Rachmaninov Competition (Russia), he began his concert career with engagements throughout Europe including appearances at the Philharmonic Hall, and the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg, at the Royal Conservatory, Stockholm, and the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki, followed by Asian tours with performances in the major halls of, among others, Shanghai, Beijing and Seoul.
In the Americas, he has appeared at the Music and Beyond Festival in Ottawa, at the National Gallery of Art and Catholic University of Washington, D.C., in Dallas, Los Angeles, Salt Lake City and more.
