The Belcea Quartet presents a fascinating program that brings together three masterpieces from the string quartet repertoire. Each piece was considered a milestone in the time in which it was written. Mozart’s String Quartet No. 19 in C owes its nickname – Dissonant Quartet – to the unusual passage with which the piece opens. ‘False’ his contemporaries will no doubt have said, but with today’s ears we listen to it quite differently.

Britten wrote his String Quartet No. 2 in C on the occasion of Henry Purcell’s 250th birthday. The composer wrote in his notes that “Purcell was the last important international figure in English music, whose greatness has unfortunately been more widely recognized on the continent than on the island that produced him.