A Day in the Life: Kevin Malone's new violin concerto inspired by tragic stories from the industrial heritage of the textile mills

Anglo-American composer Kevin Malone's new violin concerto for Andy Long, associate leader of the Orchestra of Opera North, is inspired by the industrial past of the area in which the orchestra is based. A Day in the Life, which will be premiered by Andy Long, the Orchestra of Opera North and conductor Robert Guy on Friday 3 May at Morley Town Hall, is based on the life of the early 19th century Mill Hand, Robert Blincoe who became known as the 'Real Oliver Twist'. Malone's new concerto dramatises a day in the life of Blincoe, whose tragic story captured Andy Long's imagination as a boy and seemed to form the ideal vehicle for the concerto which Long commissioned from Malone.

The concerto is being performed as part of a programme of Malone's music, all inspired by mill life, with the overture, A Peterloo Parade, based on contemporary and historical chants heard at rallies, especially those at the St Peter's Square, Manchester rally and massacre ("Peterloo") of 1819, and My Mill Life, a work for solo violin and pre-recorded monologues by current and former mill workers in Northern textile industry which will explore the relationships of the workers with their working environment.

After the premiere the programme is being taken on tour to Leeds, Saltaire, Pudsey, and Bradford, all areas associated with links to textile mills and the industrial revolution.

New York-born Kevin Malone teaches composition at the University of Manchester, and first worked with Andy Long when Long's chamber music group, The New World Ensemble, recorded two pieces by Long.

Further information from the concert series website.