When Germany invaded Austria in 1938, Robert Fürstenthal, born in 1920, took the path of many Viennese Jews and fled to the United States, where he made his living as an accountant; the fact that he had written music in his youth was soon forgotten. Reconnection, after 35 years, with the woman who had been his first love rekindled both that flame and his urge to compose, and from then on songs and chamber music flowed from his pen, preserving the spirit of fin-de-siècle Vienna under the Californian sun – ‘When I compose, I am back in Vienna’, he explained. He died in November 2016, aged 96, knowing that his lyrical, eloquent music was at last attracting the attention of both musicians and microphones.

The Rossetti Ensemble was created in 2018 from long-standing collaborations between the pianist John Lenehan, violinist Sara Trickey, violist Sarah-Jane Bradley and cellist Tim Lowe. Named after Dante Gabriel, the British poet and Pre-Raphaelite artist, the group is passionate about the repertoire of the era and the many composers who derived inspiration from Rossetti’s work, such as Debussy and Vaughan Williams. In addition to its performances as a piano quartet, the group is flexible, working with other high-profile instrumentalists and singers to produce imaginative and varied programmes.


The Rossetti Ensemble:
- Malcolm Messiter (oboe)
- Christopher O’Neal (oboe)
- Sara Trickey (violin)
- Sarah-Jane Bradley (viola)
- Timothy Lowe (cello)
- John Lenehan (piano)