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THE Southbank 15 String Quartet were a meal-deal for a lunch-time concert – they played Mozart’s Dissonance Quartet and Ravel’s Pavane For A Dead Infanta – both ravishing pieces.

However, the hitch with string quartets is historically that they act as background music and, on this warm August day, beards were stroked and eyelids drooped (in appreciation, I’m sure).

Mozart dedicated this quartet to Haydn, who rated it, but this praise wasn’t universal at the time. Irresistible playing swung the Chapel Royal audience – at times sounding like a full orchestra yet lightening the phrases where necessary, especially in the second slower movement where the first violin spun out the melody sparklingly.

The last, rather fast movement sounded rushed and initially caused tempo variances but unification was resumed and the demands of Mozart’s music met.

The Ravel piece, arranged for a quartet, has a filmic quality and is deliciously French. The first violin took the solo line with plucked accompaniment fabulously played causing eyelids to flutter in a different way. Ravel was bemused by this piece’s popularity; audiences demanded it and his students aspired to learn it. I don’t blame them – it’s a real winner.