Worthing Philharmonic Orchestra offer three masterpieces of the repertoire

Music director Dominic Grier said: “Schumann’s justly renowned Manfred Overture, by turns brooding and volatile, begins what is sure to be a compelling afternoon of music making from the 70 dedicated players of Worthing’s excellent resident community symphony orchestra.

“A cornerstone of the high-romantic imagination, stemming from the parallel literary movement, the Manfred Overture is an expressive and passionate reflection of the inner workings of the mind, as embodied in Byron’s eponymous anti-hero, and was composed as the scene-setting prelude for a larger work termed by Schumann a ‘Dramatic Poem with Music, in Three Parts’.

“The concert continues with Antonin Dvorak’s much-loved Cello Concerto in B minor. A work of truly symphonic dimensions, this concerto has been at the pinnacle of the violoncello repertoire since its première in London in 1896.

“Despite the location of its first performance, the concerto was in fact composed during Dvorak’s period in America as director of the National Conservatory of Music in New York, and it displays many of the expansive and mature compositional traits developed during this time of the composer’s life. The stirring orchestral writing is also paired with passages of great lyrical beauty, matched by a solo cello line of intense dramatic power and great virtuosity.

“The soloist at this performance is the rapidly rising star, Leo Popplewell, now Co- Principal cellist of the London Mozart Players and much in demand as a solo artist and chamber musician throughout the UK and further afield. His appearance is sponsored by the Countess of Munster Musical Trust, an organisation with which the WPO has been proud to associate itself over many years, supporting the orchestra’s mission to support emerging solo performers at the outset of their careers.

“The final work of the afternoon is Danish composer Carl Nielsen’s strikingly original and powerful Symphony No. 2, which bears the title “The Four Temperaments”. Although definitively a symphonic rather than a programmatic work, its inspiration derives from a series of comical paintings that the composer chance upon when at a village inn with his friends. These paintings depicted the four fundamental personality types — Choleric, Phlegmatic, Melancholic and Sanguine — and Nielsen’s response in turn produced music of swashbuckling vigour for the first, melodious grace for the second, epic broadly-intoned intensity and intimate contemplation for the third, and unbuttoned good humour for the last, with a surprise final twist before its unconventional but rousing ending.”

Dominic added: “I am looking forward to presenting this wonderful programme to our dedicated Worthing audience this weekend. It is an immense joy to conduct these three challenging works, and the orchestra has been playing superbly in our rehearsals for this. Leo Popplewell has been a delight to work with and is already an artist of great sensitivity and musical maturity, whose vibrant and rich cello sound is just perfect for the superb Dvorak concerto. We at the WPO are very excited to share this tremendous music with our audience, and we hope it will be as rewarding to listen to as it has been for us to prepare.

“The WPO, which celebrated its 70th anniversary back in 2019 before a capacity audience, is now playing to a standard unmatched in the memory of some of its longest-serving musicians, and consequently attracts some of the very finest players from throughout Sussex and across the South Coast.”