The Klee Quartet was formed in 2008 at the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo. They continued further chamber music studies at the Hochschule für Musik ‘Hanns Eisler’, Berlin with Eberhard Feltz and at the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire with Oliver Wille.

 

They have been invited to perform at festivals such as, Festival International der Quatuors à Cordes du Lubéron, Orlando Festival, as well as participating annually at Internationale Sommerakademie für Kammermusik Niedersachsen, and have been resident quartet at Wye Valley Chamber Music.

 

Other concert activities include, recitals organised by Proquartet and Junge Künstler stellen sich vor, the Bartok String Quartet Cycle held at Hannover Hochschule für Musik Theater und Medien, and the concert series 'Für György Kurtág' held at Hochschule für Musik ‘Hanns Eisler’, Berlin to celebrate the composer's 90th Birthday, among others. In 2014 and 2015 they performed works by Erwin Schulhoff and Brigitte Schiffer at Konzerthaus Berlin with ‘Musica Reanimata', an organisation dedicated to rediscovering music destroyed during the Second World War, both of which were broadcast by the Deutschlandfunk.

At the Royal Greenwich International String Quartet Festival 2015, the quartet was awarded first prize and prize for best performance of the set work in the Richard Carne Competition.

 

The current members are Naoko Senda, Emi Otogao (violin), Jun Ohta (viola) and Mikiko Yamada (cello), each based individually in Tokyo and Berlin. The quartet continues to hold annual recitals in Tokyo and Yokohama, a concert series which was introduced in 2016.