Cor anglais will be star of the show for Worthing Symphony Orchestra

Spokeswoman Jennie Osborne said: “Worthing Symphony Orchestra music director John Gibbons is renowned in music circles for his innovative and imaginative programming, and WSO’s concert on Sunday, October 2 is no exception.

“The only instruments on stage are stringed. A string orchestra comprising violins, violas, cellos and bassi – but no percussion, brass or woodwind, apart from just the one … the solo cor anglais (English horn) played by rising star Olivia Fraser.

“Olivia made her debut with WSO at Chichester Cathedral in 2018 and she has been a regular ever since. John Gibbons describes the cor anglais (a bigger, lower pitched variation of the oboe) as ‘the instrument composers use to melt hearts’ and nowhere is that more in evidence than on William Alwyn’s Autumn Legend, a strikingly beautiful movement for the English horn and strings, inspired by Pre-Raphaelite paintings and the poetry of Dante Gabrielle Rossetti.

“It is fitting, given the recent passing of HM Queen Elizabeth, that this programme of music, conceived during the celebrations for the late Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, aptly reflects the enormity of this moment in our country’s history.

“The music of Ralph Vaughan Williams captures the elusive qualities of Britain. Two of his home-grown compositions feature in the programme – one well known, the other less so. Fantasia on a theme of Thomas Tallis is one of his most famous and popular works, whilst his Six Studies in English Folk Song (for which he travelled the length and breadth of the country collecting folk melodies) is a little known gem.

“Yet it is perhaps Richard Strauss’s melancholic Metamorphosen, which brings the concert to a close, that makes the most apposite memorial to her majesty. Written for 23 solo strings only (ten violins, five violas, five cellos and three double basses), it is both powerful and moving, incorporating the funeral March from Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony.

“The concert starts at 2.45pm and tickets are available online at wtm.uk or call 01903 206206.”