Quatuor Diotima will give the French premiere of my String Quartet on 8 February in Paris, as part of Radio France’s Festival Présences. It will be performed alongside Tristan Murail’s Sogni, ombre et fumi, Oscar Bianchi’s String Quartet No. 3, and Augusta Reed Thomas’ octet for string quartet and percussion, Moon Chariot Rituals.

The free concert is at 6pm at the Auditorium de Radio France, before an evening concert featuring music by Ligeti, Yan Maresz, Harrison Birtwistle and Unsuk Chin.

First performed in 2018 by the Arditti Quartet, my quartet features unusual tunings for half the instruments – the 2nd violin has all its strings tuned down a semitone, the viola has its strings tuned down a tone. It’s therefore full of open strings, which form the basis of each of its five movements.