Midlands Classical Music Making

  GWYN WILLIAMS BURSARY CONCERT                                                           St Andrew’s Church Wilmcote (20.7.25) Wilmcote’s St Andrew’s, a beautiful jewel of a church, was packed to the rafters for a fascinating concert on Sunday evening which included two-and-a-half world premieres (read on). The occasion was the latest fund-raising concert in aid of the Gwyn Williams Bursary. Gwyn played in the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, where he was Sir Simon Rattle’s principal viola, for 30 years, and the Bursary was founded by his widow, Stephannie <SIC> in order to assist young string players. After a year making donations to the CBSO Youth Orchestra and inaugurating two Gwy...

                               THE BARBER OF SEVILLE                              Longborough Festival Opera (July13)   One of the many heartening elements of this joyous production is the fact that the cast was so youthful, many of them making their Longborough debuts. The future looks set fair. This was the final performance in a run which had begun early in June, insterspersed with Pelleas et Melisande , but there was no sense of end-of-term undisciplined high jinks. No, this was a grippingly tight presentation from a superbly well-drilled company, unfolding with unstoppable momentum under the fluent conducting of the batonless Elaine Kelly. Underlying everything was the deft playing of th...