Our final concert of the season, heavily French in flavour, includes some pieces with a special meaning for David and his association with the orchestra.

We are delighted to welcome Dan Bull to play the Saint-Saëns first Cello Concerto. Donald Tovey summed up this concerto with the remark that it is “pure and brilliant without putting on chastity as a garment, and without calling attention to its jewelry at a banquet of poor relations.” Dan, a founder member of Avenue Ensemble, hails from the dark side of the Pennines and is a member of the Orchestra of Opera North.

Ravel’s ballet Daphnis et Chloé in 1910-11 for Serge Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. The Suite No. 2 encompasses the final scene of the ballet and includes one of Ravel’s most brilliantly achieved strokes: dawn arrives unmistakably, with the singing of birds, the plashing of the waterfall, and the sun increasingly penetrating the mists.