No country’s music embodies a pastoral spirit quite like England’s, and no piece quite enshrines that idea like Vaughan Williams’s image of countryside serenity rendered in the most lyrical music imaginable, The Lark Ascending. Doyen of English music and former Music Director of English National Opera, Martyn Brabbins opens the symphonic season at the Sheldonian Theatre with works that portray dark clouds above green fields, including deeply moving music by composers killed at the front during the First World War. A concert that speaks of tragedy but also of comradeship includes Roderick Williams’s flute concerto, written for his childhood friend and our own Solo Flute, Anthony Robb.

Pre-concert talk by Sir Nicholas Kenyon
An English Journey
Nicholas Kenyon explores the 20th-century tradition of our national music, and talks with Roderick Williams about his new flute concerto.

Cecil Coles Estaminet de Carrefour
Butterworth A Shropshire Lad (arr. R Williams)
Roderick Williams Flute Concerto
Walton Siesta
Vaughan Williams The Lark Ascending
Walton Two Pieces for Strings from Henry V
Holst St Paul’s Suite in C major, Op. 29 No. 2

Roderick Williams baritone
Ruth Rogers violin
Anthony Robb flute
Martyn Brabbins conductor

Tickets: £15, £30, £40, £50
(Students from £5)
Time: 19:30
Duration: 120 min
Venue: Sheldonian Theatre, Broad Street

Pre-concert talk: 18:30

£15 – £50