Sunderland Symphony Orchestra gearing up for free summer concert of Beatles music and more

The talented orchestra will be staging its seasonal Summer Concert at St Gabriel’s Church, Chester Road, on Saturday, July 15 at 7.30pm.

It will feature a range of music from an Abba Medley to The Beatles and Mozart to Moon River.

Mark Greenfield the Relational Lead for SSO, said: “This concert will be our second venue of a new chapter for the orchestra in taking our public performances to different venues across the city. The orchestra is pleased to announce this concert will be a free ticketed event again, as in recent public performances since the Covid-19 pandemic.

"An open retiring collection, however, will be gratefully appreciated in supporting the activities of the orchestra. Moreover, the orchestra is looking for new opportunities to take public performances to different venues across the city that have the capacity to take up to 50 orchestral musicians and an audience capacity between 250-300.

"The orchestra would very much welcome any expression of interest in hosting SSO concerts, by theatres, churches, schools and colleges and community associations across the city to contact us via our website.”

Audiences will also be able to enjoy the orchestra for free when they perform at this year’s Summer Streets Festival in Cliffe Park, Seaburn, on July 16.

Dave Milner, the orchestra’s musical director, said: “Sunderland Symphony Orchestra is well known for producing concerts with a variety of musical styles and genres.

"However, for the summer concert at St Gabriel’s Church, we have excelled ourselves with the music on offer, hence the title, A Musical Extravaganza.

"We will feature two outstanding soloists, two home grown arrangers and everything from Gilbert & Sullivan to Gershwin, Mozart to Mancini.

"So come along and spend a lovely evening with one of the friendliest orchestras in the region.”

The concert programme for the Musical Extravaganza will include:

::HMS Pinafore Overture – Sullivan

:: Forgotten Dreams - Leroy Anderson

:: Clarinet Concerto, 2nd movement - Mozart (soloist, Lucy Beckmann)

:: Abba Medley - arranged by Richard Ling

:: Coppelia Prelude & Mazurka – Delibes

::Perpetuum Mobile - Johann Strauss Jnr

::March Militaire Française - Saint-Saens

::They Can’t Take That Away from Me, George Gershwin, (alto sax soloist Lisa Pallister)

::The Beatles - arranged by Phil Jackson

::Tyneside Suite - arranged by Stephen Whitehead

::Moon River - Henry Mancini arr, John Moss

:: L’Arlesienne, Suite No. 1 - Georges Bizet.

To obtain free tickets for the Sunderland Symphony Orchestra Summer Concert- Musical Extravaganza visit the Sunderland Symphony Orchestra Website at: www.sunderlandso.org.uk or Telephone 07887 881442.