RTWSO Official Website: Concerts

All concerts take place at 3.00pm on Sunday afternoons in the Assembly Hall, Tunbridge Wells

5 October - From Fantasy to Reality
	Roderick Dunk conductor Freddy Kempf piano Tchaikovsky Fantasy Overture: Romeo and Juliet Mendelssohn Scherzo, Nocturne and Wedding March from A Midsummer Night’s Dream Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2	Click above to find out more about Freddy Kempf
	Our concert season starts with a turbulent overture by Tchaikovsky. Taking an abstract approach to Shakespeare’s great story of doomed young love, there are strong tensions in his music depicting the rivalry between the Capulets and Montagues. We also hear some almost absurdly passionate love themes. Drawing inspiration from Shakespeare’s comedy, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Mendelssohn’s incidental music has a dainty Scherzo portraying the fairies, Oberon and Titania. His magical suite includes a heavenly, horn-led Nocturne, as well as the famous Wedding March. Brahms’s Second Piano Concerto is conceived along symphonic lines. There are mellow moments in the serene opening and delicate lyricism of the slow movement, which features a prominent solo cello. But the scherzo is impassioned with a vigorous tussle between piano and orchestra. The lightness and humour of the finale provides a remarkable conclusion to one of the grandest of all piano concertos. Sponsored by Coutts & Co

2 November - England and the Orient
	Christopher Adey conductor Robert Cohen cello Elgar Concert overture: Froissart Walton Cello Concerto Rimsky-Korsakov Symphonic Suite, Scheherazade	Click above to find out more about Robert Cohen
	Many features of Elgar's mature style, such as the short themes, restless key changes and crackling orchestration, are apparent in this early overture. His exuberant tone-poem conjures up the world of the mediaeval chronicler and poet, Jean de Froissart. An Elgarian strain comes to the fore in Walton’s Cello Concerto. The orchestra acts as a mirror for the soloist and, although each movement takes a different approach to concerto form, there is a strong sense of inner and outer symmetry making his work one of the finest in its genre. Folksong, the Orient and the sea were influences that pursued Rimsky-Korsakov throughout his career. Scheherazade has all three heard in glorious, exotic abundance. The suite has the shape of a symphony, but it is programme music based upon four stories as told by the beautiful Scheherazade to her implacable husband, the Sultan Shahryar. This popular showpiece gives all instruments the chance to show off their capabilities.

7 December - Family Christmas Concert
	Neil Thomson conductor Jennie Goossens narrator Humperdinck Overture: Hänsel and Gretel Prokofiev Peter and the Wolf Coates The Three Bears: a Phantasy Britten Simple Symphony Khatchaturian Adagio from Spartacus Leroy Anderson A Christmas Festival	Click above to find out more about Jennie Goossens
	Our family concert will delight both children and adults. It begins with Humperdinck’s overture to his opera, based on a familiar fairy story by the Brothers Grimm. Then follows Prokofiev’s classic symphonic fairy tale about brave Peter and his pursuit of the hungry wolf, aided by his friends the cat, the bird and the duck. Among British composers, Coates is a national treasure in the tradition of polished melodic light music started by Sullivan. We can enjoy the syncopated dance band idiom of the 1920s in the bear trot of his phantasy. Britten conceived his Simple Symphony from childhood pieces and the music for strings is both direct and playful. It’s a strong contrast to Khatchaturian’s tempestuous Adagio, originally from a 1954 ballet, although known to millions as the theme tune from The Onedin Line. Anderson’s medley of traditional carols closes our concert. His heart-warming arrangement captures the spirit of Christmas, putting us in the mood for seasonal celebrations. Sponsored by the Friends of the RTWSO

1 February - Classical Achievements
	Roderick Dunk conductor Benjamin Grosvenor piano Rossini Overture: The Thieving Magpie Mozart Piano Concerto No. 20 Brahms Symphony No. 4	Click above to find out more about Benjamin Grosvenor
	Rossini’s vibrant overture is one his best-known pieces. The related opera tells how a servant girl almost loses her life after being accused of stealing a silver teaspoon. She is saved when the real thief is revealed to be a magpie. The influence of Don Giovanni is never far away in Mozart’s searing concerto. Written in the minor key favoured for his most emotional music, the opening creates an atmosphere of tragic unrest. But the last movement is a mad dash leading to a starkly jolly ending. It’s a work that shows Mozart at the height of his power. The fourth symphony is the crowning achievement of Brahms’s career as a symphonist. His serious and profound work uses the lower registers of the orchestra to give an impression of the firm foundations of a musical structure. Turning convention on its head, Brahms concludes his last symphony in a mood of anguished despair. A concert for Lottie Rowntree

1 March - It’s a Brave New World
	Roderick Dunk conductor Jeremy Clack trumpet Haydn Symphony No. 94 The Surprise Haydn Trumpet Concerto Dvořák Symphony No. 9 From the New World	Click above to find out more about Jeremy Clack
	Haydn’s Surprise Symphony is among his most popular. Written at the pinnacle of his success, it’s the second of 12 so-called London Symphonies. The music contains many jokes including the most famous of all, which is a sudden loud chord in the Andante, after its tranquil opening. The Trumpet Concerto is a radiant masterpiece by Haydn. In his groundbreaking gem of a concerto, the first to use the newfangled ‘keyed’ instrument, the trumpet actually gets to play a soulful melody in the central Andante. It’s something that no Baroque composer would have written, while the finale is an outpouring of pure joy for the soloist liberated by the new technology. Dvořák hints at Bohemian and American folksong in his symphony From the New World, which is one of the most popular in the modern repertory. It suggests a sense of nature and wonder, and speaks straight to the heart.

5 April - The Civic Concert
	Derek Watmough conductor Anthony Zerpa-Falcon piano Ireland A London Overture Elgar Enigma Variations Rachmaninov Piano Concerto No. 3	Click above to find out more about Anthony Zerpa-Falcon
	Ireland’s music belongs to the school of English Impressionism. He was strongly influenced by the music of Debussy, Ravel, and the early works of Stravinsky and Bartók, and evolved a complex harmonic language close to French and Russian models. His London Overture includes a melody based on a Cockney bus conductor’s call of ‘Dilly, Piccadilly’. Many regard Elgar as a supreme English composer and the Enigma Variations transformed his fortunes. Using a technique of natural evolution, each variation of his carefully constructed theme presents a separate character portrait of ‘friends pictured within’. This large-scale work marks Elgar’s birth as total master of his musical materials. All the elements play their part, just as the people portrayed had contributed to his sense of self. Rachmaninov's Third Piano Concerto is notoriously difficult, as exemplified in the David Helfgott biopic Shine, but has become one of the most popular works in the piano repertoire.