A spectacular celebration of choral power and orchestral brilliance.
For 180 years, Exeter Philharmonic Choir has brought people together through the shared experience of great choral music. This special season celebrates the Choir's rich heritage while looking ahead to an exciting future, with performances that highlight the power, variety and enduring appeal of the choral tradition. The season opens with Carl Orff's Carmina Burana , one of the most popular choral works of the twentieth century, best known for its electrifying opening chorus, O Fortuna .
Concert-goers are in for a night of high drama at Exeter Cathedral on Saturday 16th March when Exeter Philharmonic Choir joins forces with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and four world-class soloists to perform Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem.
Verdi’s choral ‘blockbuster’, also known as the Requiem Mass, is an opera in all but name and is one of the most dramatic large-scale choral works in the classical repertoire; any performance is a grand occasion.
First performed in 1874, the Requiem is a musical setting of the Catholic Funeral Mass. It was composed as a memorial to one...
Concert-goers are promised a night of high drama as the acclaimed Exeter Philharmonic Choir joins forces with the renowned Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra and four world-class soloists to perform Giuseppe Verdi’s Requiem.
The singing of four talented soloists - Judith Howarth (soprano), Marta Fontanals-Simmons (mezzo-soprano), Oliver Johnston (tenor) and Tristan Hambleton (bass) - will draw out the intense beauty of The Requiem.
An evening of fantastic romantic melodies begins with the lyrical Adagio from Spartacus, used in many a love scene and famously in The Onedin Line, before moving on to the Piano Concerto with its much-loved soulful slow movement. The brilliant finale features one of the most popular works by the master of melody, Tchaikovsky.
Programme:
Khachaturian Adagio of Spartacus and Phrygia Shostakovich Piano Concerto No.2 Tchaikovsky Symphony No.5
Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra presnts seasonal hits and musicals magic.
Kick off Christmas with our fun-packed concert for all the family, featuring seasonal classics old and new, all wrapped up with a sprinkling of magic and sparkle.
Once again, the BSO returns to Exeter Cathedral for an atmospheric season finale. Scheherazade consisted of “separate, unconnected episodes and pictures” as Rimsky-Korsakov himself put it, from The Arabian Nights: snapshots, in other words, of a world he never knew. It is a triumph of imagination over experience; a feast of sumptuous colours and brilliant instrumental effect by the man who literally wrote the book on orchestration. Much of this brilliance is achieved by continuously dotting the score with passages for solo instruments. The...
Rachmaninov created a remarkable sound-world in his Second Symphony. Sombre harmonies complement the rich orchestration like deeply burnished mahogany. Imagine the embers of a huge log fire, beating back an icy black Russian winter’s night. The music similarly smoulders for ages, and occasionally, with or without warning, flares briefly and spectacularly. One of his earliest works for orchestra, this concerto served as the young Beethoven’s formal introduction to Viennese society. It reflects his mastery of Classical form and style, a youthful...
Schubert’s Fifth Symphony is a brilliant achievement – from the breath-stoppingly original opening gesture and effervescent themes to the grand harmonic strategy and the polyphonic skill upon which the powerful development is built. Everything about it suggests a contented spirit of its youthful creator. Mozart’s Horn Concerto No.3 has a beguiling purity of melody and timbre, emphasizing the golden tone of the solo instrument supported by an understated accompaniment. This jewel-like serenade is one of Mozart’s most...
Written in the summer of 1919, the Cello Concerto represented, for Elgar, the angst, despair and disillusionment he felt after the Great War, and an introspective look at death and mortality. He had been deeply saddened by the war, was suffering from a painful chronic ear condition, and the recent deaths of several old friends had made him acutely aware of his own advancing years. It signified Elgar’s farewell to the way of life as he had known it. “Everything good and nice and clean and fresh and sweet is far away – never to return” he...
BSO Classical Extravaganza Great Hall, Exeter University Friday 22 July 7.30pm
Back by popular demand, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra presents another spectacular night of the best-known classical music with an amazing laser display and state-of-the-art lighting special effects at the Great Hall at Exeter University on Friday 22 July at 7.30pm.
The concert explodes into life with John Williams’ instantly recognisable Star Wars theme and the sultry strains of Bizet’s Carmen evoking images of sunny Spanish landscapes.
