Edmund Finnis - String Quartet No. 1 “Aloysius”

Tom Coult  - String Quartet

Maurice Ravel - String Quartet in F major

An evening of some of the purest music ever written for string quartet by two young and brilliant British composers, and the 20th century master of timbre, form and sensuality, Maurice Ravel.

We revisit Edmund Finnis’ delicate searching sound world with its beautiful polyphony in his  String Quartet No.1 “Aloysius”, a five movement work full of poetry, the fourth movement  of which is a reflection on the hymn ‘Christe, qui lux es et dies’ by William Byrd.

We pair this with Tom Coult’s first string quartet - a work which explores the distinctive timbre of open strings in his search for the sound of a consort of viols.

And we finish the concert with Tom’s all time favourite quartet by Maurice Ravel - a work of astonishing beauty and sensuality and with an incredible use of tone colour, his imaginative and expert handling of string resources and sounds foretelling dazzling future orchestrations.

“In the name of the gods of music, and in mine, do not change a single note of what you have written.” Claude Debussy

Jonathan Morton (violin) Clio Gould (violin) Oliver Wilson (viola) Clare O’Connell (cello)