Wessex Strings

Wessex Strings perform three works by much-loved English Romantic composers.

Published posthumously in 1920, Parrys An English Suite delights in a folk-music idiom and embraces a variety of moods from the serene to the capricious.

John Irelands Concertino Pastorale was first performed in 1939, a few weeks before the outbreak of World War II; the first two movements have an intense, dark character foreshadowing the looming storm clouds, while the Finale is a liberating, bustling Toccata.

Composed in 1892, Elgars Serenade for Strings was the first of his compositions to become widely known.

At the end of his life he declared it to be his favourite work, and it has remained popular with players and audiences ever since.