The Tuning
Nocturne
String Quintet ‘Emily’s Electrical Absence’
Her Lullaby

The everyday is transfigured in this intimate collection of chamber music and songs by leading young Scottish composer Martin Suckling: Settings for mezzo-soprano and piano of five magical, moonlit poems by Michael Donaghy and a string quintet written in collaboration with the poet Frances Leviston, whose readings of her own texts frame the four movements of a piece which pays dual homage to Schubert and to Emily Dickinson.

Nocturne for violin and cello bears witness to Suckling’s night vigils at the composing desk, setting down his pen as the stillness starts to ripple with birdsong, while the cello solo Her Lullaby is a nostalgic reflection on the early years of parenthood that also displays Suckling’s characteristically refined harmonic palette.

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Recorded on 6-8 April 2021 in the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, University of York.