Max Richter’s ouvre is music for the wake of destruction; a soundtrack for the strange stillness after the fire’s wreaked its havoc, where only ashes remain. There’s no ugliness, no sharp edges, no showy moments of technical virtuosity. It’s all salve, no burn. It seems, instead, that Richter leaves that brashness to the real world and instead offers an uncomplicated, beautiful sanctuary in his work.

Max Richter and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble. Photo © Ken Leanfore.

Regardless of personal tastes on uncomplicated music, it’d be simply wrong to say that Richter and the American Contemporary Music Ensemble (ACME) underdeliver in performance. Offering top-to-tail play-throughs of his acclaimed albums In a Landscape and The Blue Books, the concert performance wonderfully performed.

Richter introduced his latest album In a Landscape, as a space for musical dualities to “talk to one another” – electric and acoustic music, found objects and composed music.

From the very first notes, the Concert Hall shook with the force of the bass of Richter’s digital organ, before ACME began to weave its lovely, tangled silk over the top; Richter’s restrained, deft writing building something bigger than the sum of...