Performances of Grace Williams at BBC Orchestras and Choirs

Dazzling woodwinds tarry with bustling strings, folk-like melodies weave with vibrant dance and climactic rushes make way to stately grandeur in Tchaikovsky’s charmingly wintery First Symphony, oozing his trademark symphonic craftsmanship from the off.

Dazzling woodwinds tarry with bustling strings, folk-like melodies weave with vibrant dance and climactic rushes make way to stately grandeur in Tchaikovsky’s charmingly wintery First Symphony, oozing his trademark symphonic craftsmanship from the off.

Striking a balance between the light-hearted and the noble, Elgar’s Variations are an ingenious collection of musical sketches of his friends plus an astute self-portrait; an enigma hidden within the score.

Striking a balance between the light-hearted and the noble, Elgar’s Variations are an ingenious collection of musical sketches of his friends plus an astute self-portrait; an enigma hidden within the score.

This colourful concert, conducted by Jaime Martín, pairs Grace Williams’ Sea Sketches with Renié’s virtuosic Harp Concerto, played by Mared Pugh Evans, before Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony charts a dramatic journey from struggle to triumph.

Under Chloe Rooke, this all female programme explores orbiting worlds and folk memory. Mazzoli’s Sinfonia shimmers, Augusta Read Thomas’s new Cello Concerto brings lyricism with Laura van der Heijden, followed by atmospheric music by Williams...

Guest conductor Emilia Hoving joins the “warm, bright” British baritone (and BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist) Andrew Hamilton on a guided tour for the ears: from Respighi’s glittering panoramas of Rome, to Grace Williams’s bracing Sea Sketches.

Sea, sky and symphonic power shape this programme from evocative seascape to heroic close. Grace Williams’s Sea Sketches shimmer, Beethoven’s “Emperor” Concerto features Alim Beisimbayev, and Sibelius’s Fifth Symphony ends in triumphant sweep.