Wye Valley Music’s November concert will be given by the Brompton quartet ( Maja Horvat (violin), Mee-Hyuan Esther Park (violin), Wallis Power (cello) and Edward Keenan (viola) at Monmouth’s Bridges Centre at 3pm on Sunday, November 12

Local audiences will already know the Quartet from their impressive performances as this year’s Quartet-in-Residence at the Wye Valley Chamber Music Festival at Treowen Manor near Monmouth in February; BBC Radio 3 regulars will know them from ‘In Tune’ where they recently appeared with viola player Lawrence Power and London-hawks will have seen them at Wigmore Hall, King’s Place and St Martin-in-the-Fields, the latter venue awarding them first prize in its prestigious 2019 Chamber Music Competition. They are also Park Lane group artists.This is a young ensemble that is steadily and determinedly going places.

Their programme at 3pm on Sunday, November 12th includes works by Haydn and Beethoven and by contemporary American composer Jesse Montgomery.

Born and raised in Manhattan’s Lower East Side in the 1980s during a time when the neighbourhood was a hotbed of artistic creativity, Jesse is an acclaimed composer, violinist, and educator and her works are frequently performed around the world. The Washington Post describes her music as “turbulent, wildly colourful and exploding with life” and Strum certainly lives up to this description.

Composed in 2006, Jesse says of Strum “Originally conceived for cello quintet, the voicing is often spread wide over the ensemble, giving the music an expansive quality of sound. Within Strum, I utilised texture motives, layers of rhythmic or harmonic ostinati that string together to form a bed of sound for melodies to weave in and out. The strumming pizzicato serves as a texture motive and the primary driving rhythmic underpinning of the piece. Drawing on American folk idioms and the spirit of dance and movement, the piece has a kind of narrative that begins with fleeting nostalgia and transforms into ecstatic celebration”

The programme includes works by Haydn, Montgomery, and Beethoven – String Quartet No. 13 in Bb Major, Op. 130; Grosse Fuge, Op. 133

Tickets are available now.  To buy tickets, visit wyevalleymusic.org.uk and follow the links. If you have any difficulty booking, please leave a message on the help line 01291 330020.