Malcolm Arnold Festival - concertos to the fore

This year's Malcolm Arnold Festival in Northampton will be putting the composer's concertos centre stage. The Festival runs from 19 to 20 October 2013 with events in Northampton centred on Royal and Derngate. Both Arnold's works for guitar and orchestra, the guitar concerto and the Serenade, will be performed by the Berkeley Ensemble. John Gibbons will be conducting the Ealing Symphony Orchestra in the Organ Concerto, Recorder Concerto and a suite from Sweeny Todd. Clarinettist Julian Bliss will be performing the 2nd Clarinet Concerto in a programme which includes Arnold's film music. 

The festival will be opened by Dame Monica Mason who danced the part of Clytemnestra in the world premiere of Arnold's Electra at the Royal Ballet in 1963 (with choreography by Robert Helpmann). New work in the festival includes a fanfare by Toby Young who won the Malcolm Arnold competition in 2010 and a new piece by Michael Berkeley.

Full information from the Malcolm Arnold Festival website.