Trio Volant

Performers

Notes on the performers

Trio Volant was formed in 2010 whilst all the members were studying at the Royal Northern College of Music. The Trio regularly give formal recitals and lunchtime concerts in and around Manchester, the North West and nationally from The Isle of Arran to Newport to Devon! Past engagements have included recitals for Darlington Music Society, Little Gaddesden and District Concert Club, Wisbech Concert Society, Buxton International Music Festival, Huddersfield Music Society, Harlech Concert Society, Harrogate International Music Festival, Lincoln International Chamber Music Festival and Maldon Festival of Arts amongst many others. The Trio particularly enjoy the opportunity to perform the lesser known reed trio chamber music repertoire. The Trio were awarded the Dorothy Parkinson Memorial Award for Young British Musicians in 2017 and were Recommended and Selected Artists for Making Music 2019-2020.

Tom Evans

Tom graduated from the Royal Northern College of Music with a Master of Music degree, supported by a Rowland Hardy Bequest Bursary. During his studies at RNCM, Tom was the recipient of the Winfield Graham Solo Wind Prize. In addition he received funding from the Wolfson Foundation. Since graduation Tom has enjoyed a varied and busy freelance career combining orchestral and chamber music performance, music for health and teaching. As an orchestral player he has performed with the Hallé Orchestra, Opera North, BBC Philharmonic, Raymond Gubbay’s Manchester Concert Orchestra and Sinfonia Viva amongst others. With Trio Volant, he gives recitals up and down the country for music clubs and societies.

Beatrice Hubble

After receiving a Batchelor of Music degree from the University of Manchester, Beatrice went on to The Royal Northern College of Music where she was accepted onto the solo Performance Masters’ course with Britain’s leading contemporary oboist, Melinda Maxwell. Whilst at the RNCM, Beatrice was the recipient of a Fewkes Scholarship, won the June Emerson Chamber Music prize with the oboe trio, Les Trois Canards and was selected to perform as a soloist with several ensembles. She graduated in 2011 and now freelances with professional organisations including the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic and Skipton Camerata.

Alice Braithwaite

Alice is a freelance bassoonist based in Manchester. She has performed with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Northern Ballet Sinfonia and plays regularly with several regional orchestras across the North West and Wales. She has worked alongside members of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Academy of St. Martin in the Fields and Manchester Camerata. As a student she was on the Professional Experience schemes with the BBC Philharmonic and Hallé Orchestras and the Britten-Pears Young Artist Programme in 2018 under Marin Alsop. She performs regularly with her wind quintet Lír and with her duo partner, Rachel Fright.

Programme

Programme notes

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

Marriage of Figaro Overture

The Marriage of Figaro, K. 492, is a commedia per musica (opera buffa) in four acts composed in 1786 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, with an Italian libretto written by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It premiered at the Burgtheater in Vienna on 1 May 1786. The opera’s libretto is based on the 1784 stage comedy by Pierre Beaumarchais, La folle journée, ou le Mariage de Figaro (“The Mad Day, or The Marriage of Figaro”). It tells how the servants Figaro and Susanna succeed in getting married, foiling the efforts of their philandering employer Count Almaviva to seduce Susanna and teaching him a lesson in fidelity. The overture is in the key of D major; the tempo marking is presto; i.e. quick. The work is well known and often played independently as a concert piece

Source: Wikipedia

Paul Pierné

Bucolique Variée

Born in Metz, he was a cousin of composer and organist Gabriel Pierné. His first musical lessons were from his father Charles, himself a former student of César Franck. Pierné later studied at the Conservatoire de Paris under Georges Caussade and Charles Lenepveu. He received a mention in the 1903 Prix de Rome, and took second place in the competition in 1904. He served as organist at St-Paul-St-Louis Church in Paris, succeeding his father in the position in 1905 until his own death in Paris 1952. His compositional output was wide-ranging, including two operas, several ballets, two symphonies, a number of orchestral tone poems, and chamber music, as well as largeform religious works, including two masses, an oratorio, and several smaller choral and organ works.

Source: Wikipedia

Cecelia McDowall

Century Dances

Born in London, 1951, Cecilia McDowall has won many awards, been short-listed eight times for the British Composer Awards and in 2014 won the Choral category of the British Composer Awards for her haunting work, Night Flight, which celebrates the pioneering flight of the American aviatrix, Harriet Quimby, across the English Channel. McDowall’s distinctive style speaks directly to listeners, instrumentalists and singers alike. Her most characteristic works fuse fluent melodic lines with occasional dissonant harmonies and rhythmic exuberance. Her music has been commissioned and performed by leading choirs, including the BBC Singers, The Sixteen, Oxford and Cambridge choirs, Kansas City Chorale, ensembles, and at festivals worldwide.

Source: ceceliamcdowall.co.uk

Georges Bizet

Carmen Suite

The Carmen Suites are two suites of orchestral music drawn from the music of Georges Bizet’s 1875 opera Carmen and compiled posthumously by his friend Ernest Guiraud. They adhere very closely to Bizet’s orchestration. However the order of the musical allusions are in reversed chronological order, and do not adhere to the operatic versions entirely, although the Suite is directly inspired by Bizet’s opera. Guiraud also wrote the recitatives for Carmen, and compiled the second of the two suites from Bizet’s L’Arlésienne incidental music. Each of the Carmen Suites contains six numbers. Both suites have been performed and recorded many times.

Source: Wikipedia