Peter Cropper was one of the most admired chamber musicians of his generation. Born in Southport in 1945 into a family of string players, he played in the National Youth Orchestra and studied at the Royal Academy of Music, where in 1965 he founded the ensemble that became the Lindsay String Quartet. He led the quartet for 40 years, performing worldwide, recording acclaimed Beethoven cycles and working closely with Sir Michael Tippett, who wrote his Fourth and Fifth Quartets for them. The quartet won a Gramophone Award in 1984 and a Royal Philharmonic Society Music Award in 1991, and its members were granted the Honorary Freedom of the City of Sheffield.
Peter was a tireless champion of chamber music and the young musicians who would carry it forward. In 1984 he became founding Artistic Director of Music in the Round in Sheffield, which by 2005 was the largest promoter of chamber music in the UK outside London. He taught at the Royal Northern College of Music and led an MA in string quartet performance at the University of Sheffield. After the quartet retired, he continued to perform until his passing in 2015, notably in a piano trio with Moray Welsh and Martin Roscoe. His belief that great music should reach as many people as possible is one the Trust shares, not least through its Recital Scheme. Peter served as a Trustee on the board of the Munster Trust from 2005 until 2015.
The Peter Cropper Award is an annual award given to the most outstanding string player, selected by the Trustees from the string auditions for the Munster Study Grant held each spring.
The first recipient of the award was Leo Appel (2025). This year, the award was won by Ezo Sarici (2026), an exceptionally talented violinist who is also a composer, arranger and multi-instrumentalist, as well as co-artistic director and founder of PYFA.
See below for ways to donate to help support the continuation of the Peter Cropper Award.
