Wai-te-ata Music Press

String Quartet No. 2 – ‘Luminous Night’ is a reflection about hope, a journey through darkness to light. This is expressed by frequent references throughout the quartet to an ancient Irish melody for the hymn Christ Be With Me, which is part of The Deer’s Cry attributed to Saint Patrick. This quartet, performed as one movement, opens with a lament for the cello. Motifs from the hymn tune, from the lament, as well as from a rising three-note figure, gradually build in intensity. They culminate in a fiery passage of sharply accented chords and scale-like figures, which eventually subside to a return of the cello lament. This transitions to a more expansive texture leading to a folk-like dance, before the quartet concludes quietly with a fuller statement of the hymn tune as well as tui song.

String Quartet No. 2 – ‘Luminous Night’ was premiered by the New Zealand String Quartet on 4 February 2017 at the Adam Chamber Music Festival in Nelson.