A World of Quartets - Raja Quartet

The brilliant Raja Quartet opens a treasure trove of great music from the first half of the 20th century, from Ukraine, Argentina, Austria and Ireland.

Prokofiev - String Quartet No.1 [1930]

Webern - Langsamer Satz [1905]

Aloys Fleischmann - Quartet Movement [c.1930]

Ginastera - String Quartet No.1 [1948]

Donetsk-born Prokofiev’s first-string quartet was first performed in Washington in 1931. At the time Prokofiev was living in Paris, having fled his native land after the 1917 Russian Revolution. This wonderful quartet combines music of exuberant brilliance with gorgeous tunes and a deep, expressive melancholy.

Webern’s Langsamer Satz is a beautiful and passionate love song to his future wife, written in the rich late Romantic sonorities of his teacher Schoenberg’s Verklaerte Nacht.

Aloys Fleischmann wrote his lovely Movement for String Quartet while a student at University College, Cork 1927-1932. It was performed privately in Munich in 1932 but not publicly until 2010 when the RTÉ Vanbrugh Quartet played it in UCC’s Glucksman Gallery - and many times thereafter.

Ginastera’s stunning first-string quartet is still one of the great unknowns in the quartet repertoire. Rooted in the rhythmic energy of Argentinian folk tradition this is wild and thrilling music - save for a haunting slow movement - and will bring this concert to a memorable close.

Raja Quartet:

Phoebe White, violin

Claire Wells, violin

Martin Moriarty, viola

Callum Owens, cello