Live music returns to Horsham

In some of the first public concerts since lockdown, the Sussex-based professional chamber orchestra are going to give three performances of William Walton’s Façade at St Mary’s Church, Horsham on Saturday, September 19 at 2pm, 4pm and 6pm.

Stane Street Sinfonietta was set up in 2018 by conductor Steve Dummer and composer John Woolrich to gather together professional musicians who live in Sussex.

As Steve says: “There are so many top musicians that have strong connections with Sussex through birth, upbringing or having moved here. It’s such a great place to live and so convenient to get to London where much of their work is but they very rarely get to play near home.”

The group takes its name from the Roman road that connects Chichester and London which is, metaphorically, the road the musicians often take on their way to work. Their debut concert was at St Mary’s, Horsham in 2018 and they feature on a recent CD release of clarinet music by composer and Sussex resident John Hawkins.”

Steve added: “Written in the 1920s and combining the rather eccentric poems of Edith Sitwell with the jazz and music-hall influenced score of William Walton, Façade has been a great hit ever since. Due to a limit on numbers to comply with social-distancing regulations, only 75 tickets will be available at each performance but it promises to be a very special occasion featuring some of the country’s foremost musicians many of whom have been really hit by the loss of income incurred through lockdown.”

As for the coming months, Steve added: “More ambitious plans for the future have had to be put on hold for the time being but with the valuable assistance of St Mary’s Church, they are able to put on a short series of small-scale concerts to bring live music back to Sussex.

“Some of my colleagues have found it very difficult to find venues willing to stage concerts but St Mary’s have been so helpful and enthusiastic to have us back and they have all the necessary protocols in place for us to follow so it’ll be a very safe environment. Because of social-distancing rules we’re limited to the number of players we can have on stage so Façade is the ideal piece to do – as well as being great fun to play and to listen to it only uses six instrumentalists and a couple of reciters so there’ll be enough space.

“The reciters in these performances are well-known Horsham residents Katy Ellis and Mark Bradbury. Katy is a recent graduate of GSA actor-musician course and has worked for the past two years on various theatre productions including UK tours and in London theatres and Mark has trodden the boards of many an operatic stage and concert platform across Europe including a number of years with Glyndebourne Opera.”

Steve Dummer, conductor of the Stane Street Sinfonietta, is well known to local audiences as the conductor of the Horsham Symphony Orchestra and grew up in the area being a member of the West Sussex Youth Orchestra and Symphonic Band in the 1980s. Amongst the musicians in the orchestra are professional flautist Henry Roberts who played in the Horsham Symphony Orchestra as a schoolboy and Toril Azzalini-Machecler, who recently made a huge impression in the percussion section final of the BBC Young Musician.

The performances, lasting about an hour, will follow Government safety guidelines to prevent the spread of COVID-19 including socially distanced seating, hand sanitisers on entry and a requirement for audience members to wear facemasks. Tickets are £12 and £5 for under 18s and are only available in advance: www.stanestreetsinfonietta.com