We are delighted to welcome not one but four young soloists for tonight's concert from the Sheffield Music Hub and the Sheffield Music Academy.
Emma Rae Ward will be singing from the “Chants d'Auvergne" ("Songs from the Auvergne"), a collection of folk songs from the Auvergne region of France arranged for soprano voice and orchestra by Joseph Canteloube between 1923-1930. The songs are in the local mediaeval language Auvergnat, a dialect of Occitan.
Cellist Perris Heath is playing Fauré’s Élégie. Originally composed for Cello and Piano, Fauré was asked for a version for cello and orchestra which was premiered in April 1901, with none other than Pablo Casals as a soloist and the composer as conductor.
Mabel Bailey will delight on her flute with a Ballade by Carl Reinecke, one of the most influential and versatile musicians of the second half of the 19th century. Ballade is charming and tuneful. Reinecke understood the instrument very well.
Daniella Arnold joins us to share Massenet’s “Méditation”. The piece was originally composed as a symphonic intermezzo from the opera Thaïs and comes at the point when Athanaël, a Cenobite monk, has just confronted Thaïs, a beautiful and hedonistic courtesan and a devotée of Venus, and attempted to persuade her to leave her life of luxury and pleasure and find salvation through God. This piece is her meditating on this idea. Today it is considered to be one of the great encore pieces.
In addition to this feast, the orchestra will be playing Bonis’s Bourrée and Mendelssohn’s first Symphony.
The full programme for the evening is:
Fauré: Élégie (Cello)
Bonis: Bourrée (Orchestra)
Massenet: Méditation from Thaïs (Violin)
Reinecke: Ballade (Flute)
Canteloube: Songs of the Auvergne (Soprano)
Mendelssohn: Symphony No. 1 (Orchestra)
