Few other ensembles can match the range of Fretwork’s repertory, spanning as it does the first printed music of 1501 in Venice, to music commissioned by the group this year. This extraordinary breadth of music has taken them all over the world since their debut in 1986; but they now prefer to travel by train and car. Their recordings of the classic English viol repertory – Purcell, Gibbons, Lawes, Dowland & Byrd – have become the benchmark by which others are judged, while their newly-commissioned music has included works by Sir George Benjamin, Nico Muhly, Elvis Costello, John Woolrich and many others. The consistently high standards they have achieved have brought music old and new to audiences hitherto unfamiliar with the inspiring sound-world of the viol.