BRITTEN SINFONIA WITH IMOGEN WHITEHEAD
Clicking "Buy tickets" below will take you to the booking page of an external website.
Performers
- Imogen Whitehead
- trumpet
- Britten Sinfonia
Programme
- Wagner
- Siegfried Idyll
- Hummel
- Trumpet Concerto
- Arvo Pärt
- Fratres (version for wind octet)
- Beethoven
- Symphony No. 1
Britten Sinfonia’s Principal Trumpet Imogen Whitehead is the soloist in Hummel’s beloved concerto.
Britten Sinfonia’s Principal Trumpet Imogen Whitehead is the soloist in Hummel’s beloved concerto, written in 1803 for Viennese virtuoso Anton Weidinger and his keyed trumpet, the predecessor of the modern valve trumpet. Hummel shows it off with difficult keys and chromatic passages that are as challenging still to play today as they are thrilling to hear.
Hummel’s career spanned the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras - represented here by his friend Beethoven’s brilliant first symphony, and Wagner’s stunningly beautiful “symphonic birthday greeting” for his wife Cosima, premiered on Christmas Day 1870.
As part of our celebrations of Estonian composer Arvo Pärt’s 90th year, we hear a rarely performed version for wind octet of one of his most celebrated works, the haunting and sombre Fratres – featured in more than a dozen films, including The Place Beyond The Pines and There Will Be Blood.
“outstanding solos from trumpeter Imogen Whitehead [...] were the icing on the Christmas cake.”