BBC Music Magazine

This subtle but arresting disc showcases works for strings by two acclaimed Iranian composers, and is performed with beauty, character and precision.

In the mid-’70s, Majd spent several years travelling to remote Iranian villages collecting and recording music, and the fruits of this fieldwork continue to infuse her composition. Her Dreamland Quartet (1997, revised 2006), is startlingly imaginative in its fluttering, interweaving textures, while also evoking the sonorities and mood of Iranian Dastgah music. Majd’s Faraghi (In Absentia)(2017) for violin and cello refers to a particular form of northeast Iranian song that expresses the sorrow of being separated from a loved one, and customarily deploys a repeating phrase throughout. By turns delicate and ferocious, Majd’s duet draws on this song-form indirectly through continuously recurring motifs, notable stark repeated sevenths in the work’s final movement.

The string quartet Broken Times (2017) by Tafreshipour is luminous and complex. It features beautiful gauze-like textures intermittently pierced by jagged fragments of melody, while his Pendar for solo violin (2017) evokes a similarly reflective mood and is performed with particular assurance and colour by violinist Darragh Morgan.

This is an excellent disc, mesmeric in tone, and featuring accomplished and committed performances throughout.
Performance (4 stars)
Recording (4 stars)

—Kate Wakeling