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Music of Mystery and Melancholy: Solo Recital at St John's Smith Square

Mystery and Melancholy: Ancient and Contemporary keyboard works by English composers

Zubin Kanga, piano

Dowland – Melancholy Galliard

Thomas Adès – Darknesse Visible

Gibbons – ‘Lord of Salisbury’

David Gorton/Giles Farnaby – Farnaby’s Maske (world premiere)

Purcell – Ground

Michael Finnissy – Z/K

Byrd – Pavan

Morgan Hayes – Pavan and Galliard (world premiere)

Locke – Prelude, Sarabande and Jig

Adam de la Cour – The Virginal Grimoire (world premiere)

Bull – Fantasia

George Benjamin – Shadowlines

Pianist, Zubin Kanga performs English music for the keyboard separated by three centuries: works by great composers of the Elizabethan age alongside works by contemporary English composers who have been inspired by music of past eras.

Works for lute, virginal and harpsichord by John Dowland, Henry Purcell, Orlando Gibbons, William Byrd, John Bull and Matthew Locke and are here transcribed and arranged for the piano. Many living composers draw on the music of earlier centuries: Thomas Adès scatters Dowland across the keyboard in Darknesse Visible, David Gorton imagines discovering a missing work by Giles Farnaby, Morgan Hayes creates a mashup of 17th-century styles, Michael Finnissy draws his inspiration from the earliest experiments with the symphony, Adam de la Cour enacts an ancient magic ritual, and George Benjamin takes the traditional form of the canon and uses it to explore extremes of expression and virtuosity.