The world is at a critical moment of conversation and action around protecting the climate, the natural world and the beings that share our planet.

City of London Sinfonia and Professor James Sparks explore the fundamental patterns of life on this earth, and the beauty and inspirations they enable – through the work of two great musicians, Béla Bartók and John Adams.

Bartók was an avid collector of minerals, insects, and plants, with a soft spot for sunflowers and fir cones. His Divertimento springs from his collection, with its complex (and at times frantic!) romantic form bound by simple rules and patterns.

Adams similarly draws inspiration from the natural world, incorporating its beauty, power, and rhythms. His work Shaker Loops combines simple and repeating melodic patterns to create a complex tapestry – a rippling, shimmering texture, evoking ripples across water.

In this first of concert series Patterns of Nature, we invite you to join us for an evening that will reframe these two works and strengthen the desire to protect this planet, and all that it has inspired.