Wymondham Symphony Orchestra will be offering an avian themed concert on Saturday 25th November in Wymondham Abbey, entitled Birds of Myth and Fable. We hope to see many of you there to enjoy a very different event for us!

Dvo?ák's The Wood Dove will be the first piece, one of a cycle of four orchestral poems which tells a tragic story of love and despair. Four musical scenes describe the story of a woman who poisoned her husband and married another man shortly after. A dove sits and sings a sad song full of guilt and melancholy.

This will be followed by Cantus Arcticus (Concerto for Birds and Orchestra) by the Finnish composer Rautavaara, which incorporates recordings of bird song recorded near the Arctic Circle and on the bogs of Liminka in northern Finland. The result is a haunting and evocative sound. There are three movements to enjoy: “The bog” opens with woodwind and birdsong, followed by “Melancholy” including the song of a shore lark. The final movement is “Swans migrating” which is a long crescendo for the full orchestra alongside swan calls, before fading as if flying away into the distance.

The final piece will be Stravinsky's Firebird Suite which was written for the 1910 Paris season of Sergei Diaghilev's Ballets Russes company. We will be playing the 1945 version in which Stravinsky reorchestrated much of the original work and altered the structure, which he completed on the request of Leeds Music in order for the orchestration to be recopyrighted in the US. We have really enjoyed getting stuck into this challenging music, and hope you will enjoy the story narrated alongside each movement.

Tickets are available online at www.trybooking.com/uk/eventlist/wso. There will also be some availability on the door, but we encourage attendees to purchase tickets in advance to beat the queues. Prices are £15, Friends of the WSO £13 and Under 18s are free.

More details about the orchestra can be found at www.wymondhamsymphonyorchestra.org.uk or on our Facebook page.