Goethe’s dictum that architecture is frozen music has been a powerful stimulus for composers over the centuries, but in the case of Morgan Hayes the stark features of modern industrial buildings rather than the splendours of the Gothic or Baroque styles have been an impressive influence.

In the case of his most recent work, Völklinger Hütte, the great German steel foundry of that name, in operation for over a hundred years, was the trigger for a powerful yet succinct one-movement structure fo...