The Westbourne Orchestra continues to attract large audiences and the Spring 2006 concerts series which took place at St Peter & St Paul's Church, Ringwood on Saturday 25th March; St Ambrose Church, Westbourne on 31st March; and St Thomas’ Church, Ensbury Park on Saturday 1st April proved to be no exception. Included in the audience at St Thomas’s was four-month old baby Sadie, granddaughter of violinist Stella Hughes, who sat on her mother’s lap on the front row and chortled, gurgled, smiled and slept throughout the whole performance. Thus in addition to providing entertainment, the Orchestra is able to contribute donations to various worthy causes.  Some £900 on this occasion.

Amateur orchestra instrumentalists have to pay to play but there are some expenses, which are normally deducted from the proceeds. The balance is donated, notably in this case, to the Church funds of St Peter and St Paul's Church Ringwood and the Boo Charity which was set up to help disadvantaged children in Kenya and in memory of Sarah Hicks (nicknamed Boo) as well as to the League of Friends of Hahnemann House and Herbert Hospital.

The Westbourne Orchestral Society is greatly indebted to the officials of all 3 churches for permitting their churches to be used as concert venues and for the provision of refreshments during the intervals.

The concerts opened with the brilliantly orchestrated Capriccio espagnol by Rimski-Korsakov. This lively and sometimes dramatic music provided the opportunity for several solo instrumentalists to display their individual skills especially the leader Jane Bultz.

As the year 2006 is the 250th anniversary of the birth of W A Mozart the series included Piano Concerto No. 23 in A.  The Orchestra was extremely fortunate to have been able to persuade award winning Japanese pianist Hiroaki Takenouchi to travel to Bournemouth for the concerts.  Hiro performed with great dexterity, sensitivity and charm.  The applause he received at the conclusion from the very enthusiastic audiences was very well deserved.  Hopefully, the WOS will be able to invite Hiro to play with them again in the not too distant future.

The concerts concluded with the very popular Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony and performed with great skill and dexterity by the Orchestra.

Next WOS concerts are to take place on 17th, 23rd and 24th June 2006.

WOS Review 23/VK
9th April, 2006