We are delighted to welcome again the ever-popular Sacconi Quartet, who are noted for their unanimous and compelling ensemble and fresh and imaginative approach to music. The quartet has now celebrated 20 years together, still with the original four members. For this concert they are joined by the distinguished clarinettist David Campbell, who has made a speciality of the quintet repertoire.

The Brahms quintet was a late masterpiece, inspired by the playing of Richard Mühlfeld, which has become a corner-stone of the repertoire.

Arthur Bliss wrote his lyrical and expressively melodic post-Romantic quintet in 1932, partly in memory of his brother, a clarinettist, who had been killed on the Somme.

The music of Rebecca Clarke (1886-1979) is only now being rescued from undeserved obscurity. Born in England, and a pupil of Stanford at the Royal College of Music, she was a professional viola-player before settling in America.