Chamber Music at Merton

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 while his Russian counterpart delivered a collection of graceful, mellow and humorous pieces. If the two composers sound 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.