News & Engagements

NEW Sinfonia Concert

NEW Sin­fonia presents con­cert in aid of Hope House Hos­pices on Sunday 29th January 2012 at the Pa­filwn Llan­gollen Pa­vilion starting at 7.30 pm . Fea­tures an ex­citing pro­gramme of Mendels­sohn: Hebrides Over­ture, Mozart:  Sin­fonia Con­cer­tante, Vaughan Wil­liams: Rhosymedre and Beeth­oven: Sym­phony No.8.

We are de­lighted that the second stage of our ex­citing new journey is to be in Llan­gollen at the In­ter­na­tional Pa­vil­lion. We wel­come highly ac­claimed vi­ol­inist Daniel Roberts (who hails from Den­bigh) and vi­olist Char­lotte Bon­neton who play with the Castalian String Quartet, re­cent Royal Over­seas League Chamber Music Award Win­ners. Our leader for this con­cert is Mikhail Gurevich, him­self an out­standing vi­ol­inist with the London Haydn String Quartet. The con­cert fea­tures a per­form­ance of a spe­cial piece ‘Rhosymedre’. This hymn tune was written by Welsh Anglican Priest John David Ed­wards who named his tune after the vil­lage where he was vicar from 1843 to 1885. Vaughan Wil­liam de­scribed this as his fa­vourite hymn tune and was in­spired to or­ches­trate it.

Young mu­si­cians raising money for the young people of Hope House Children’s Hospices.

Rehearsals with the Huddersfield and Slaithwaite Philharmonic Orchestras

On Tuesday 10th January I was re­hearsing again with the HPO, working on Polish com­poser Witold Lutoslawski’s Con­certo for Or­chestra. It is written in three move­ments and is re­garded as a crowning achieve­ment of folk­lor­istic style in his music. The con­cert on Sat­urday 4th Feb­ruary 2012, also in­cludes Verdi Force of Des­tiny Over­ture and Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker.

On Sunday 15th and Monday 16th January I will be working with the SPO in their final re­hearsals for Mahler’s Sym­phony No.3; a truly amazing work!  Their con­cert is on the 21st January 2012. Two con­certs not to be missed.

Conductor to the Orchestra of Square Chapel, Halifax

After a hugely suc­cessful New Years Gala Con­cert on Sunday 8th January 2012, I am de­lighted to an­nounce that I have been in­vited to con­duct the or­chestra on a per­manent basis.

Or­chestra of Square Chapel is the res­ident or­chestra at Square Chapel Centre for the Arts, Hal­ifax. A mix­ture of pro­fes­sional, semi-professional and gifted am­a­teur players, the or­chestra has a repu­ta­tion for in­nov­ative pro­gram­ming. Moving as­suredly from Bach and Beeth­oven to Berkeley and Ar­thur But­ter­worth, the or­chestra has sev­eral world premiere per­form­ances to its credit. Orchestra of Square Chapel were re­cently to be heard on Radio 3 as part of the Listen Up Fest­ival of British and Con­tem­porary Composers.

Trafford Music Service Christmas Concerts

In my work for the music ser­vice I work as a violin/viola teacher, string work­shop leader, vocal coach and con­ductor. Over the weekend of the 10th and 11th December we have our an­nual Christmas Con­certs. On Sat­urday 10th from 10am at the Robert Boult Theatre Sale, the Stret­ford and Urmston Music Centre chil­dren will be per­forming. I con­duct the String En­sembles at both centres and teach violin/viola at Stret­ford Music Centre.

Secondly, the Traf­ford Youth Orchestra’s Con­cert day starts from 3pm again at the Robert Boult Theatre on Sunday 11th December. The Ju­nior String Or­chestra which I con­duct will play at 3pm. We will be per­forming music by Beeth­oven, Shos­takovich and Kathy Black­well. The or­chestra is con­tinu­ally growing in size with chil­dren reg­u­larly pro­gressing to the more ad­vanced Sin­fonia and Phil­har­monic Orchestras.

Cantorion Rhos Choir 30th Anniversary

It’s a spe­cial year for the choir. We have given two con­certs over the last week at Bangor-on-Dee Church and the Maelor School Penley in N.E Wales, show­casing local singers Hannah Priestley and Conal Sayers at Bangor, and then with Ruth Bet­ter­idge of the RNCM. Hannah and Conal are both au­di­tioning for music col­leges and are new mem­bers to the choir. The choir have pro­gressed rap­idly with this con­cert ex­per­i­ence and we are now in great shape for our spe­cial an­niversary con­cert at the Stiwt, Rhos on Sat­urday 3rd December at 7pm. We wel­come in­ter­na­tional ac­claimed so­loists Ca­m­illa Roberts and Ro­land Wood. The choir will be joined by a small en­semble for a per­form­ance of Vivaldi’s Gloria be­fore singing with Ca­m­illa and Ro­land in the second half. It prom­ises to be a spe­cial night not to be missed!