Wednesday 11 December 2024 7:30pm

Beethoven  –  String quartet no. 10 in E flat major, op 74
Stravinsky  –  Three Pieces for string quartet
Purcell (arr Britten)  –  Chacony in G minor
Britten –  String quartet no. 2 in C major, op 36

The Treske Quartet – graduates of the Royal Northern College of Music – has already appeared in our Afternoon Concert series and is earning a growing reputation. A concert in January 2024 was reviewed in The Observer when their sound was described as ‘meticulously blended’ and their playing had ‘all the impassioned intensity needed’. They describe their programmes as accompanying audiences through a range of music, finding new connections.

Middle-period Beethoven opens their concert at Ilkley – the op 74 was advertised as ‘The Harp’ by its publisher because of its use of plucked arpeggios. But more importantly it shares with Britten’s second string quartet the use of variation form in the final movement. Britten wrote this quartet to celebrate the 250th anniversary of Purcell’s death and it is preceded by his version of a Purcellian set of variations – the Chacony in G minor. The Stravinsky could not be more different – three gleaming gems from completely outside the quartet tradition!