BUTTERWORTH – ELGAR - BRAHMS
As part of a programme full of variety in the spacious acoustic of Frome’s Cheese & Grain, the Mid-Somerset Orchestra will complete a cycle of Brahms’ symphonies under principal conductor Martin Freke with its first ever performance of the 3rd Symphony, a work of much passion and tenderness as well as nobility. It was dubbed as Brahms’ “Eroica” by Hans Richter, its first conductor.
The programme will also feature Elgar’s popular song cycle “Sea Pictures” for contralto and orchestra, with soloist Elisabeth Stirling. First performed in 1899 with Dame Clara Butt, the 5 songs reflect humanity’s diverse relationship with the elemental sea. One of the poems used is written by Alice, Elgar’s wife.
The concert opens with George Butterworth’s idyll “The Banks of Green Willow”, a beautiful meditation and celebration of all things English pastoral and rural, subsequently all the more poignant and full of nostalgia for the fact that in 1916, 3 years later, age 31, the composer was killed in action leading a raid on a Somme offensive. One of the brightest hopes of British Music of his day was thus wiped out.
Cheese & Grain, Frome, Somerset
Tickets all unreserved, available from Cheese & Grain Box Office, tel. 01373 455420: £9 (full), £7 (concs.), £1 (18 & under) Or come along on the night and buy on the door. There’s plenty of room!
Please click here to e-mail orchestra chairman Martin Lovell or phone 01749 343852 or 01458 842405 if you are interested in further information.
Clich here to see a biography of Elisabeth Stirling