White Flame: Scottish premiere of David Matthews' work celebrating Muriel Spark's centenary

Muriel Spark, Rome c1971-74 (Photo © Jerry Bauer)

2018 was the centenary of the Scottish novelist Muriel Spark, and as part of the celebrations composer David Matthews (born 1943) wrote White Flame, a setting of five of Spark's poems, for the Nash Ensemble. The work was premiered at the Purcell Room on the Southbank in 2018, and now in a sort of coda to the centenary the Nash Ensemble is to give the work's Scottish premiere at the Queen's Hall in Edinburgh on 27 January 2020.

Written for mezzo-soprano and piano quintet, White Flame will be performed in Edinburgh by mezzo-soprano Victoria Simmonds and members of the Nash Ensemble, the performers who premiered the work. Before the concert there will be a chance to hear composer David Matthews in conversation with Alan Taylor, (past chairman of the Muriel Spark Society, the group which commissioned the work in the first place) talking about Matthews' choice of poems.

The concert will be completed by Mozart's Piano Quartet, Schumann's Piano Quintet and Brahms' Two Songs Op. 91 for voice, viola and piano.

The concert is presented by the New Town Concerts society, full details from the Queen's Hall website.