ONE of the most popular pieces of choral music to be written in recent years will receive its Herefordshire premiere in June.
The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace is in the Leominster Choral Society's programme at the Priory on June 5. Karl Jenkins wrote it to commemorate the millennium and extracts are often heard on Classic FM.
The concert will also include music by Grieg, Sullivan and Stanford as one of the major attractions of this year's Leominster Festival.
Another musical highlight in the Priory will be an appearance by the Birmingham Philharmonic Orchestra on June 12, featuring Rachmaninov's lyrical Second Symphony. Byron Parish will play the fiendishly difficult First Violin Concerto, which Shostakovitch wrote for David Oistrakh.
The Festival runs from June 3 to 12 and includes audiences with "the man in the white suit" Martin Bell and cricket commentator Henry Blofeld. There are also a three mile walk in the Arrow Valley, talks on Daphne du Maurier and Rudyard Kipling and a concert by Tibetan monks.
Details of these and other attractions are in the Festival brochure. The box office at 12 Buttercross Arcade is now open.
Michael Baws
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