The James Allen Community Orchestra staged a concert to celebrate the life and work of celebrated composer and James Allen’s alumni Ralph Vaughan Williams.
Called ‘To the Very Essence of Things’, the concert was dedicated to the Queen and held in the Vaughan Williams Auditorium (VWA) at James Allen’s Girls’ School (JAGS) Sunday, September 11.
Vaughan Williams was the director of music at JAGS in 1904 and went on to become one of the nation’s most beloved composers.
His works are still widely performed and his most famous composition ‘The Lark Ascending’ has been voted No.1 in the Classic FM Hall of Fame a record 12 times.
Peter Gritton, Director of Music at JAGS, said: “The Community Orchestra concert that we held in the VWA at JAGS on Sunday turned out to be as fitting a remembrance of Queen Elizabeth II as it was a celebration of the Vaughan Williams 150th anniversary. It was an evening bursting with symphonic masterpieces, in all of which the healing power of music was palpable.”
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Along with his close friend and fellow composer Gustav Holst, who remained at the school for fifteen years, Vaughan Williams remains a source of musical inspiration for pupils.
The concert featured anecdotes, letters, hymns and a programme of Vaughan Williams’ orchestral music.
It was part of the RVW150 celebrations, organised by the Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust, to commemorate the composer.
The concert took its name from a Vaughan Williams quote: “I believe that all the arts, and especially music, are necessary to a full life.
“It is necessary to know facts, but music will enable you to see past facts to the very essence of things in a way which science cannot do…”