Edward Bhesania hears the UK premiere of Hough’s own Piano Quintet, together with pieces by Mozart and Dvořák, at London’s Queen Elizabeth Hall on 9 October 2025
Formed only a decade ago, the Viano Quartet was an ideal partner for Stephen Hough, proving itself as capable of reaching interpretative depths as Hough was of revelling in youthful agility.
The concert opened with Mozart’s String Quartet in B flat major K458 (‘Hunt’), projecting into the 900-seater Queen Elizabeth Hall with a pristine cohesion that seemed entirely effortless. The performance lacked nothing in charm, liveliness or style.
Hough joined the group for the UK premiere of his Piano Quintet, Les noces rouges, based on a grisly vignette from Willa Cather’s 1918 novel My Ántonia, in which Russian brothers Pavel and Peter are tasked with taking home a bride and groom after their wedding festivities. But, when their sleigh is set upon by a pack of savage wolves, the brothers throw the newlyweds overboard in order to secure their own getaway.
As a composer, Hough revels in the storytelling, from the opening church hymn and ardent expression of love to the rumbustious wedding feast and alarming sleigh ride, lurid and harshly driven. The players squared up to the work’s inconceivably wild abandon with ninja-like abilities.
Led by violinist Lucy Wang, Dvořák’s Second Piano Quintet was in its own way no less colourful, realised by what was clearly an army of generals, but one entirely in step within its ranks.
EDWARD BHESANIA
Read: Classical concerts should be shorter to attract younger audiences, says pianist Stephen Hough
Review: Takács Quartet: Dutilleux, Hough, Ravel
Read: Violinist, cellist and string quartet receive Avery Fisher Career Grants
No comments yet