On Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’s 80th birthday the Proms pays tribute to this leading figure in contemporary British music with a late-night programme of works selected by the composer.
The concert overture Ebb of Winter, commissioned by the Scottish Chamber Orchestra as part of its 40th-anniversary celebrations, captures the rugged, rough-hewn beauty of Davies’s Orkney home. We see a different side of island life in the joyous ebullience of the much-loved An Orkney Wedding, with Sunrise. The fourth Strathclyde Concerto, for clarinet and orchestra, completes the concert – a thrilling tour de force, demanding equal virtuosity from soloist and ensemble.
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