Chamber Music at Merton

Britten String Quartet No. 1 in D major, Op. 25
Prokofiev Five Mélodies, Op. 35
Hahn Piano Quintet in F sharp minor

Mark Viner piano
Soloists of the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra

Benjamin Britten and Sergei Prokofiev were both exiled in America when they wrote the works performed at this concert in the TS Eliot Theatre. Far from home, the British composer produced a time-stilling string quartet of graceful, mellow and humorous pieces. If the two composers sounded guarded in those works, Reynaldo Hahn will appear to burst loose in his piano quintet – a bold, brilliant and big-boned masterpiece of chamber music that comes with an irresistible, impassioned French sweep.