Haydn’s beautiful ‘Seven Last Words’ string quartet is a meditation on Christ’s words from the cross, traditionally performed in the season of Passiontide. The texts that inspire each musical movement are called the Words of Forgiveness, Comfort, Relationship, Abandonment, Distress, Fulfilment and Reunion. Alongside Haydn’s surprisingly serene music, Ruth Padel (who describes herself as a poet ‘born with Freud at one shoulder and Darwin at the other’) will read her series of poems Seven Last Words and An Earthquake, each poem informed by deep reflection on contemporary suffering and humanity.

The concert will last c 80 mins with no interval.

• Alexi Kenny, Tim Crawford – violins
• Hélène Clément – viola
• David Waterman – cello
• Ruth Padel – reader

‘Wonderful, audacious, minutely crafted. The magnificent central section about the crucifixion is an imaginative feat and her command of register is masterly, moving from formal to conversational with graceful authority.’ – The Observer

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