The English Symphony Orchestra, the International Orchestra of Elgar Country, return to the Shirehall stage in Hereford on the 25th February for another of their hugely popular Shirehall Sunday concerts under the baton of their Artistic Director and Conductor, Kenneth Woods. The programme includes the world-premiere of a new Violin Concerto by the ESO’s Composer-in-Association, Philip Sawyers, to be performed by violinist Alexander Sitkovetsky, Schumann’s thrilling Second Symphony and Felix Mendelssohn’s evocative Hebrides Overture. There will be a free pre-concert performance by the ESO Youth Orchestras at 2.45pm.

“Sasha Sitkovetsky is, quite simply, one of the greatest violinists anywhere in the world,” said ESO conductor Kenneth Woods. “We work with him as often as we can. Audiences love his playing, his warmth and his communicative gift and he works with the orchestra with the charisma of a great soloist balanced with the insight and generosity of spirit of a great chamber musician. He’s also just incredibly nice and fun to work with.”

Sitkovetsky will be giving the world premiere of Philip Sawyers’ new Violin Concerto, and the concert concludes with a performance of Schumann’s Second Symphony, a Woods speciality and part of a complete cycle of the Schumann symphonies being offered by the ESO throughout 2018. Recently hailed by The Guardian as a “charismatic American conductor” Woods’s complete recorded cycle of the Schumann symphonies on Avie Records has been hailed by critics for its “boundless vitality, scrupulous fidelity to the printed score, delicious wit and (above all) entrancing freshness of new discovery” (Classical Ear). ArtistXite have said of his Schumann recordings that “His Schumann is a revelation: transparent, graceful, melancholy, exquisitely romantic… The final result may be the most compelling reawakening of Schumann in the last decades.”

The ESO are the official orchestra-in-residence for the music hubs in both Herefordshire and Worcestershire, and are also resident orchestra for Hereford Sixth Form College and Kings School Worcester. Every year the ESO offers weekend Beginners and Intermediate Youth Orchestra courses during school holidays, and at 2:45pm on the 25th February the ESO will welcome the Beginners’ Youth Orchestra to the stage of Shirehall for a performance of works learned at their most recent course at Malvern College. This performance is free and open to the public.

Book by telephone via Worcester Live 01905 611427 or online via www.eso.co.uk