String Quartet
Finished in June 2021, Becky’s Barossa Girl is a string quartet tribute to Becky’s dear friend Ruth Prescott who died in 2019. Becky was commissioned to write this 15 minute work reflecting Ruth’s spirit and her joy of life by Ruth’s husband, Kelvyn Prescott OAM.
This four movement work spans a life, from childhood in a big family, through her love of those close to her, her incredible work ethic, leadership and contribution in South Australia caring for people who were vulnerable. The final movement is a tribute to her strong faith in facing a terminal illness in her mid-60s.
It is Llewellyn’s musical portrait of her friend, but also a journey we each make through the many wondrous stages of life’s unfolding.
The string quartet is the perfect instrumental ensemble to reveal these many life colours, full of feeling as the various movements unfold with the four intertwining voices. The music suits a professional quartet.
The Stringybark Quartet premiered Becky’s string quartet, Barossa Girl on 3 November 2024 as part of Chamber Music Adelaide’s On the Terrace mini festival. Playing in the SA Museum’s Pacific Cultures Gallery the Stringybark Quartet, founded in 2020 by Belinda Gehlert, violin, Emma Perkins, violin, Linda Garrett, viola, Gemma Phillips, cello, cemented their reputation as a deeply moving string quartet with great technical facility and interpretive verve.
Becky Llewellyn was commissioned by Kelvyn Prescott to write a string quartet after his wife Ruth died. Barossa Girl is Becky’s musical portrait of Ruth Prescott, a well-known Barossa resident and her friend of many decades. Musical portraits are few and far in between, as how do you portray the many wondrous stages of life’s unfolding through music? In Barossa Girl, the first movement opens to reveal childhood fun with her siblings. The second, slower movement has a love theme based on her mother’s name, Edna (E-D & A) whom she loved deeply. The third movement is full of the energy, drive and passion of Ruth’s leadership and work ethic, so evident to those who knew her. Finally, a solemn, but uplifting tribute to her faith in facing a terminal illness in her mid-60s.
The work has been called, ‘joyful, captivating, accomplished, refreshingly light at times with lots of movement then rich and flowing…haunting’.
Barossa Girl for String Quartet
Where to buy
You can purchase Barossa Girl directly from Becky by emailing her: