Formed in 2002 at the Royal Northern College of Music under the guidance of the late Dr Christopher Rowland, the Quartet were Junior Fellows at the RNCM and postgraduate students of the Alban Berg Quartet in Cologne. The Quartet has won numerous prizes and awards, including Second Prize in the 2007 Melbourne International Competition and First Prize in the 2005 Florence International Competition. They have taken part in the International Musicians Seminar at Prussia Cove and during 2008 were resident quartet at the Britten-Pears School in Aldeburgh and at the Verbier Festival in Switzerland.

In 2009 the Navarra‘s gave debut concerts at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Philharmonie in Luxembourg and Schwetzinger Festspiele and took part in the Haydn series at Wigmore Hall, broadcast by BBC Radio 3. They also recorded Haydn’s 7 Last Words on the Cross for Altara Records for which they commissioned 9 paintings for illustrated performances from world-renowned artist Jamie Boyd, and gave performances at the Royal Northern College of Music and the City of London Festival.

Over the last two years the Quartet has appeared at major festivals and venues in Europe including the Rheingau and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern Festivals in Germany, the Aix-en-Provence and Bellerive Festivals in France, the Kattegat and Sandviken Festivals in Sweden, and given recitals in Italy, Ireland, Russia, the USA and Bahrain. They have toured throughout the UK and worked with Wayne MacGregor‘s Random Dance Company on a new work called Entity with music by Joby Talbot giving a series of performances at Sadler’s Wells and in Aldeburgh and Amsterdam.

Future plans include return visits to Wigmore Hall and Aldeburgh, concerts in Switzerland, Italy, France, the Netherlands and Bahrain and a tour throughout Australia including recitals in Melbourne and Sydney and a residency at the Huntingdon Estate Music Festival. In 2010 the Quartet record their first CD for Challenge Records as part of a long-term recording project.

Collaborative artists with whom the quartet has worked include the Elias and Sacconi Quartets, Richard Harwood, Guy Johnston, Hansjörg Schellenberger, Jiri Hudec, Julius Drake, Allan Clayton, Patricia Bardon, John O'Conor and Alasdair Tait. They have broadcast for BBC Radio 3, RAI 3 (Italy), Radio 4 (Holland), SWR (Germany), Radio Luxembourg, Swiss Radio and ABC Classic FM (Australia).

Passionate about education, the Quartet are an associated quartet at the RNCM, have residencies at Repton School in Derby and at St Christopher‘s School in Bahrain and are part of the Wigmore Hall’s Chamber Challenge program.

Recent reviews:

“A rarity, on the other hand, was a performance in the basilica by the Navarra Quartet of Haydn’s string quartet in G op.33 No. 5 and Mozart’s noticeable reference (to it – Haydn’s piece), the quartet No.15 in d KV 421; performed impulsively and dynamically, but also with admirable filigree by the musicians…. the Navarra quartet unfolds the adorable setting in Haydns largo or Mozart’s andante with breathtaking tension into full bloom”. Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (Rheingau Musik Festival, July 2008)

“The Navarra Quartet brought some good humoured playing to Haydn’s Op.64 No.6….many magical moments in Thomas Ades Arcadiana….the Mendelssohn was outgoing and it’s Schnittke fearless.” The Strad (Melbourne International Chamber Music Competition, July 2007))

"The outstanding quartet playing of the whole Fest was giving us by the Navarra Quartet. The group formed at the RNCM in September 2002 with three Dutch members and an English cellist. It was no surprise that they were multi-prize-winners at home and abroad, and had gained the RNCM's professional performance diploma with distinction. Joined by pianist, Vyacheslav Sidorenko, their Sunday afternoon recital of Shostakovich's Prelude and Fugue No. 15, Schnittke's quartet No. 3, Shostakovich's piano quintet and Shostakovich No. 3 was a truly remarkable experience. Totally at one with the music and each other, these talented young players are on their way to top acclaim in the chamber music world. By comparison the St Petersburg Quartet…though superb, did not play with such all-consuming believe." ESTA Magazine, January 2006 (Soviet-Festival Manchester, January 2006)

"Moments of intuitive chamber work and cellist Nathaniel Boyd's compelling melodic lines were signs of good things to come…Shostakovich's marathon third quartet came to life in subtle shades of humour and gravity. The young anglo-dutch ensemble played with an uncanny wisdom…."  The Strad, January 2007 (Wigmore Hall, September 2006)

"The Navarra Quartet opened the programme exactly a hundred years after Shostakovich’s birth with the composers eight quartet, a reading of much insight and dedication.” The Musical Opinion (Purcell Room, September 2006)

Xander Van Vliet (violin) started to play the violin at the age of seven. Two years later, he entered the class for talented young people at the Enschede Conservatory in the Netherlands. When Xander was thirteen years old, he was accepted in to the Amsterdam Conservatory where he studied with Maarten Veeze, Jaap van Zweden, Ilya Grubert, and Jan Repko. Xander is currently studying for a Masters degree at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester. In July 2004, he won the chamber music award for violin at the RNCM (the Rodger Raphael Prize) and in 2005 Xander was awarded the RNCM's Professional Performance Diploma with distinction. He has attended masterclasses with artists such as Theo Olof, Herman Krebbers, Lewis Kaplan, Professor S. Shalman, and Lorand Fenyves. As well as having been the assistant of both Jan Repko (violin) and Dr. Christopher Rowland (chamber music), Xander is a tutor of violin at Chetham's School of Music in Manchester. Xander plays a Francesco Zani, an Italian violin made in 1751.

Dutch violinist Marije Ploemacher began her studies in the Hoekschewaard, Holland, before joining the ‘Young Talent Class’ at the conservatoire of Utrecht to study with Joyce Tan. In 1998 she continued her studies with Jan Repko and Ilya Grubert at the Sweelinck Conservatoire in Amsterdam. For several years Marije led the Netherlands Youth String Orchestra with which she also performed as a soloist and from 2002-2005 she was a member of the European Union Youth Orchestra.

In 2002 Marije came to England to study at the Royal Northern College of Music with Jan Repko. During her time at the Royal Northern College of Music Marije won numerous prizes, including all the RNCM’s chamber music prizes as a member of the Navarra Quartet.  As a soloist Marije performed Shostakovich’s violin concerto No. 1 with the RNCM’s Symphony Orchestra after winning the prestigious concerto auditions held at the RNCM  in 2003 and in the following years performed concertos by Tippett and Schnittke with the same orchestra, most recently the Brahms ‘Double’ Concerto with cellist Nathaniel Boyd. Awarded the RNCM’s highest accolade, the Gold Medal, Marije went on to gain her B(mus) from the RNCM with First Class Honours and her Professional Performance Diploma (2005) and Postgraduate Diploma (2007) both with distinction. Marije has won a Myra Hess award from the MBF and the Allcard Award from the Worshipful Company of Musicians and came third in the NYOS Staffa Award Competition in 2005.

Marije is a violin tutor at Chetham's School of Music and plays a Julius Caesarus Gigli of 1761.

Simone van der Giessen (viola) was born in Amsterdam in 1984. She started to play the violin at the age of five and received private tuition from Julia Veerling and Jeroen de Groot. In September 2002 she moved to Manchester to study at the Royal Northern College of Music with Jan Repko and in 2004 she began studying viola with Predrag Katanic. After graduating in June 2006 with First Class Honours she won the RNCM's Cecil Aronowitz Prize for viola and performed Walton's concerto for viola with the RNCM Symphony Orchestra in June 2007.

Future engagements include a Royal Festival Hall recital with pianist Amy de Sybel. Simone has performed in the masterclasses of Garfield Jackson, Marco van Pagee, Isabel Charisius and Thomas Riebl and attended various festivals such as The California Summer Music Festival, Bowdoin International Music Festival and The International Musicians Seminar Prussia Cove in Cornwall. She recently commenced her Masters degree at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, studying viola with David Takeno. This has been made possible by organisations such as the Petronella Andriessen Foundation, the Han and Rosa Dunk-Samehtini Foundation and the Gulberg Foundation who are all subsidiaries of the Prins Bernard Cultuur Foundation of the Netherlands as well as the Martin Musical Scholarship fund.

Simone plays on a mid 19th Century English viola of an unknown maker.

Nathaniel Boyd (cello) is a passionate and dedicated musician who combines a busy chamber music career with frequent solo engagements. He studied at the Junior Guildhall and the Royal Northern College of Music with Hannah Roberts and Ralph Kirshbaum, graduating in June 2005 with First Class Honours, a PPRNCM (Distinction) and the Leonard Rose Prize. He went on to postgraduate study at the RNCM and recently graduated with a starred first in performance.

Nathaniel has participated in masterclasses with Mstislav Rostropovich and Bernard Greenhouse amongst others. He appears regularly as both a recitalist and with orchestra, most recently performing Shostakovich's First Cello Concerto and Brahms' "Double" Concerto with violinist Marije Ploemacher and the Royal Northern College of Music Symphony Orchestra. 

In October 2009, as winner of the Tillett Trust Young Artists' Platform, Nathaniel will make his Wigmore Hall recital debut with his duo partner, Simon Lane and in November, Nathaniel will tour Australia under the auspices of Musica Viva performing with the pianist Alexander Boyd.  

Nathaniel plays a Grancino cello of 1695.

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