Hastings Philharmonic Orchestra offers Bartok’s Violin Concerto No 2 and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No 5 on a special night in Christ Church, Silchester Road, St Leonards, TN37 6GL.

With violin soloist Ayşen Ulucan and under conductor Marcio da Silva, the concert is on Saturday, May 3 at 7pm. Tickets range £0 from £25, with the orchestra’s pay what you can system available to all online (www.hastingsphilharmonic.com) and on the door.

As Marcio says, the concert comes at a good time for the orchestra despite frustrations with the Arts Council: “This year has been going really well. In October we had our first big orchestral concert in the season and it was our best sold concert so far and also with the free tickets. Not only are the free tickets increasing but also the paid-for tickets.”

The disappointment is the disappearance of Arts Council funding: “We are in a good position apart from the fact that we've had our last four Arts Council applications unsuccessful which is really strange. They give us a lot of small reasons which we then fix but we still don't get the funding. It means that we can do fewer concerts in the summer. Two years ago was the last time that we got the funding and we did a large number of concerts. Last year though we didn't get the funding we still did large number of concerts but this year we have decided not to. We're still doing a lot but this year we have decided to stay in Hastings. It is difficult. I'm going to see if I can find out what the problem is but it does feel that we're in the dark. We had three or four successful applications but now we don't really know what is happening.”

But musically the orchestra is certainly on a high: “We are offering a unique programme. The Bartok is very rarely played because it's so difficult and the Tchaikovsky is one of the big favourites

“Ayşen is the soloist. She has been wanting to play this concerto for a while. And our biggest sponsor is a very nice man from Hastings who helps us so much. We said to him pick a piece you want us to play and he picked this one which coincided with what Ayşen was wanting to perform.

“It is not an easy piece to listen to. You need to know your classical music to enjoy it to the fullest perhaps but it's still a really cool piece. I'm really enjoying preparing it but it is very challenging for the orchestra and it is good to programme it with the Tchaikovsky which is such standard repertoire – though it is also very difficult to play. But it's a really good balance.

“And it's lovely to be playing this in Christ Church. People will be watching the concert with the orchestra right next to them. They will feel that they are in the orchestra. And also it is part of the 250th anniversary of Christ Church this year. One of the reasons we brought this concert to them is to say thank you to them. We do so many concerts there and we use the church quite a lot.”

As for those free tickets: “Through my experience and seeing the audiences that we have got in Hastings it feels to me that most of the time people are not coming to classical concerts not because they haven't got the money. It's more a question of they don't have the culture. They don't have the tradition of going to classical concerts. These concerts feel for them quite daunting. They don't feel that they would feel comfortable or that they would know how to act or how to dress. I think what we need to do is really push people through the doors so that more and more people have that experience of coming and they can see what it's all about and they become more comfortable and more confident about it all. And OK you might not like one piece but you will start to realise that you will like something in the next concert. You don't stop going to the cinema just because you've seen a film that you don't like.”