Love and Death

One of the UK’s finest chamber ensembles, the Navarra Quartet, presents a programme of music exploring those eternal human preoccupations: Love and Death. Tolstoy’s Kreutzer Sonata, inspired by Beethoven’s work, in turn prompted Janáček to write his String Quartet No.1, a piece that reflects Tolstoy’s story of passion and drama. Schubert’s immortal ‘Death and the Maiden’ Quartet includes variations based on his song of the same name, in which the maiden attempts to delay Death’s advances. In Chrysanthemums, Puccini evokes flowers at an Italian funeral, and Spanish composer Joaquín Turina wrote The Bullfighter’s Prayer about a bullfighter’s moment of contemplation before facing his audience, and his own mortality. These works are interspersed with gems by Kurtág, including a piece composed as a memorial for some of his dearest friends. The Navarra Quartet describes this programme as an “imaginary dialogue”, and the unique, conversational rapport of these musicians draws the listener into their intricate musical world.