The cancellation of two live chamber music festivals in a row has created havoc with the Festival’s commissioning of new work. Deirdre Gribbin’s new Quartet was due to be premiered in 2020, so its first performance has been postponed twice and we are very grateful to the Pacifica Quartet for including it in their second on-line performance for the Festival. They had a zoomed transatlantic rehearsal with the composer before the recording and she has also been filmed in London talking about her new work. Dark matter is one of the great mysteries of intergalactic science, like many astrophysical entities its existence can only be inferred as at this point in time it is the only solution to an otherwise insoluble problem. The work was written to celebrate the 30th Anniversary of the Hubble Telescope. From music that looks bravely into the future, we move to music that looks back to folk music, In 1941 as the Nazis neared Moscow, Prokofiev along with other artistic labourers, was evacuated to Kabarda-Balkar in the foothills of the Caucasus. There he was persuaded to write a quartet that made use of local Balkar and Kabardinian music. The opening movement is brutal, brash and martial, not surprising given the times – within three months he had to be evacuated further south to Tbilsi as Hitler’s armies were approaching the Caucasus. The Adagio is an interlude of great beauty before the infectious, wild Karbardinian dances take over the Finale.

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