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Commissioned by the Northern Sinfonia in 1976 with the prize of the Dio Fund administered by the Arts Council of Great Britain which the composer won that year.
This three movement piece had its genesis in an interest in fin de siecle Vienna, especially the painting of Gustav Klimt. The first movement of the quintet presents a response to Klimt's 'Judit I', the opening trills and decorations neing a musical image comparable to the colour saturation of the portrait. This supports the rest of the movement's material.
The middle movement is on an emotionally smaller scale, being a set of elaborations of an opening monody with a short, more jagged, central episode.
The finale os a kind of moto perpetuo which gradually builds up speed to its climax: a restatement of the opening of the first movement.
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Leeds
United Kingdom