Around £600 has been raised for the Lord Mayor of Portsmouth’s Annual Appeal at the Portsmouth Philharmonic’s latest charity concert, featuring music by British composers.
Entitled ‘Home Grown’, an audience of 70 people enjoyed the concert at the Church of the Resurrection in Drayton, as well as raising money for a good cause.
The varied programme, conducted by Ka Wai Cheng (pictured above), assisted by orchestra leader Colin Wilkins, got under way with a rousing rendition of Richard Rodney Bennett’s Farnham Festival Overture, followed by an orchestra ‘first’.
Doreen Carwithen’s Suffolk Suite was the first time the orchestra had performed a concert by a female composer. The first half was brought to a close with the ever-popular George Handel’s Fireworks Suite.
After the interval, Ernest Tomlinson’s Suite of English Folk Dances was deftly balanced with a more continental theme, as the programme closed with Benjamin Britten’s Matinees & Soirees Musicales, based on music by Rossini.
Gerald Vernon-Jackson, the Lord Mayor, said: “The concert was really interesting. Some things I knew already, like Handel's Firework music, but also pieces I didn't know by British composers, which were really good, and the Suffolk Suite, that was particularly fine.”
The Lord Mayor added that his appeal was trying to raise £50,000 to give 50 smaller charities £1,000 each.
“Coming up to Christmas, so we're trying to raise money for local food banks and the pantries. My thanks to the orchestra for putting on this concert to help raise money for that.”
Since it was founded in 2009, the orchestra, which is supported by Bishops Printers, has raised more than £25,000 for local good causes.
Its next concert is on Sunday March 22 (3pm) again at the church and will include Bruch’s double concerto for clarinet and viola and feature soloists Robert Blanken and Catherine Lawlor. Tickets will go on sale in February and the concert is in aid of Spark Community Space.