Thursday 27 June, 7.30pm

David Corkhill conductor

Zanete Uskane violin

Programme to include:

Strauss - Metamorphosen

Prokofiev - Violin Concerto No.2

St John’sresident orchestra opens the Festival with a programme including two major works which bookended the Second World War. Composer of Romeo and Juliet, Sergei Prokofiev struggled against Stalin’s regime to write the music that he wanted. In his dazzling second Violin Concerto of 1935, he found his true voice: a simple, uplifting song of hope in a doomed society. Written in the final months of the war in 1945, Richard Strauss’ Metamorphosen for 23 solo strings paints a heartbreaking portrait of a world forever changed by war.