Though many pundits have declared the symphony dead as a viable contemporary format, there is still plenty of life left in the string quartet as a medium offering a vehicle for a huge diversity of musical thought.

But, as Wednesday's remarkable programme in Bromsgrove's perennially stimulating "Mixing Music" series revealed, there are still exciting riches to be found even in the traditional string-quartet structure, with Matthew King's Quartet 2001 making a profound impression.

As its title implies, the piece is in some ways a reaction to the September 11 atrocity, but this 35-minute work can well stand on its own, distanced from such topicality. Its emotional core is the third movement of the four, a deeply-felt set of variations which communicates as richly as anything in late Haydn. Religious thought lies behind much of King's inspiration, exhilarating proof that music can still convey inner content. This is a work which deserves frequent performance.

Like all the offerings here, it is written with great understanding of string-quartet texture, and the adept Fitzwilliams seized upon it gratefully. They also gave an assured première to Intricate Web, commissioned by Bromsgrove Concerts from Liz Johnson, MM's current composer-host.

Clearly defined structurally and with listener-friendly thematic crampons, this is Johnson's third quartet. It was good to revisit her first, too, in a generous programme which also included Coventry student Mat Atkinson's Buried, idiomatically written but with ideas too big for its stipulated four minutes, Jeremy Thurlow's mysterious Ancient Stone at Twilight and Schnittke's tersely-sorrowing Canon in Memoriam Igor Stravinsky.