Violinist Anton Kontra was born and grew up in Hungary and trained by Ede Zathureczky in Budapest. In 1965 he moved to Denmark and bacame one of the most important personalities of Danish musical life.

He won prizes at the Bach Competition in Leipsig and the Wienawski competition in Warsaw. He was one of the leading violin soloists in Scandivavia, and for a generation he functioned as a unique dynamo in Danish musical life - as the leader of the Kontra Quartet, as the leader of the Zealand Symphony Orchestra and later the Malmö Symphony Orchestra, and as a soloist.

Together with the Kontra Quartet Anton Kontra wasgiving concerts in the USA, in Japan and all over Europe as well as making recordings, playing in TV productions and giving master classes.

The Kontra Quartet was one of Denmark’s most sought-after ensembles, and regularly played cross-over concerts with jazz musicians like Chick Corea, Niels Henning Ørsted Pedersen and Mads Winding. Thanks to a huge recorded output – over forty recordings for among other labels BIS, EMI, Philips, Columbia and Dacapo – the quartet has left its unmistakable mark on all genres of the repertoire: for example complete recordings of the quartets of Tchaikovsky, Dvorak, Kodaly, Vagn Holmboe, Niels W. Gade, Rued Langgaard, Poul Ruders, Hans Abrahamsen, Per Nørgaard and others. Particularly worth singling out is the recording of Vagn Holmboe’s collected quartets, which has received innumerable awards and has been crucial to the composer’s international breakthrough.