Speakers for string Quartets

This comes up often and the answer is always the same: Any well designed speaker will reproduce any music sent to it as a "music specific" speaker is simply silly. 

^Agree^
 

Piano and vocals are the hardest to fake as we are pretty evolutionarily well tuned into the voice… and pianos are purer tones.

If they play those well, then everything else is sure to be nice as well.

I have ATC SCM 19s mated (very well) with a Dynaudio 18s dual 9" sub

The ATC’s are smooth and accurate with extended but not intrusive highs

Where string notes drop into the sub range the sound is musical and precise - YoYo Ma’s Apalachian Journey albums sound fantastic.

got to be esl57

Certainly electrostatics.

It's funny because I do have an answer... sort of. First of all, it goes without saying that the other components beside speakers are of paramount importance too. I haven't been exposed to lots and lots of audio gear, but of those I've heard the best electronics for string quartet were Accuphase (oh, and an expensive DAC from Luxman).

This being said, the best speakers for string quartet that I've heard are the Harbeth M30.2's. Overall I preferred my Spendor SP2/3R2's so I sold the Harbeths but for string quartets they were kings. My current Martin Logan Impression 11A are also good (when paired with Accuphase) with better detail, extension, effortlessness etc. but not quite as convincing timbre and less tactility.

So, yeah, Harbeth. And another contender might be Sonus Faber.