Hawthorne String Quartet has been played on NTS in shows including True As Few w/ Mark, featured first on 15 November 2022. Songs played include String Quartet (1921).

Named for New England novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Hawthorne String Quartet includes Boston Symphony Orchestra violinists Ronan Lefkowitz and Si-Jing Huang, violist Mark Ludwig, and cellist Sato Knudsen.

Since its inception in 1986, the Hawthorne String Quartet has performed extensively throughout Europe, South America, Japan and the United States, including major festivals such as Tanglewood, Ravinia and Aspen. The Quartet has an expansive repertoire ranging from the classics of the 18th and 19th centuries to contemporary works. It has distinguished itself internationally by championing the works of composers persecuted during the Nazi regime, with an emphasis on the Czech composers incarcerated in the Theresienstadt concentration camp (Terezín).

In October 1991, the Quartet performed in Terezín and Prague in ceremonies hosted by President Vaclav Havel to mark the opening of the Terezín Ghetto Museum and to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the first transports to Terezín. In November 2002, they performed additional concerts at the invitation of President Havel and under the sponsorship of the U.S. State Department. The concerts were part of a diplomatic cultural mission to raise funds for Czech flood relief and restoration efforts at Pamatník Terezín. Maintaining a close bond with the Czech Republic, the quartet has returned repeatedly for performances, master classes at the Prague Conservatory, and film projects, including the documentaries “Terezín: Resistance and Revival” and “Creating Harmony.”

The Quartet's CD entitled Chamber Music from Theresienstadt, received international critical acclaim and won the Preis der Schallplattenkritik in 1991. Their Silenced Voices CD on Northeastern Records also premiered newly recovered music of composers persecuted during World War II. The Quartet’s first recording of the string quartets by Pavel Haas and Hans Krasa (which was included in London Decca's Entartete Musik Project) was awarded Belgium's Cecilia Grand Prix Special Du Jury. The award was presented in recognition of "an exceptional undertaking and paying homage to an interpreter who has made a mark on the history of recorded sound." Their next recording on the London Decca label was Ervin Schulhoff's Concerto for Solo String Quartet and Chamber Orchestra. The quartet gave the American premiere of this work with Seiji Ozawa and the Boston Symphony Orchestra and the German premiere with Deutsch Kammerphilharmonie. The Quartet was appointed Quartet-In-Residence at Boston College in 1998.

In addition to the commissioning and performance of new chamber works, upcoming projects include the Remembrance & Beyond project collaboration with artist Jim Schantz and the Terezín Chamber Music Foundation. 2008-09 Hawthorne String Quartet concert tours include chamber and solo appearances in Europe and the United States.