City: Milton Keynes

FANTASIAS & FLIGHTS: THE LARK ASCENDING

Ensemble 360

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Tuesday 4 March 2025, 8.00pm

Tickets:
£22 – £24

Book Tickets
String quartet players of classical music group Ensemble 360, with their instruments
Home› What's on› FANTASIAS & FLIGHTS: THE LARK ASCENDING

HOLST Phantasy String Quartet
BRITTEN Three Divertimenti for String Quartet
HOLBROOKE Eilean Shona 
HOWELLS Phantasy Sting Quartet Op.25
PURCELL (transc. Warlock) Three-part Fantasias 1,2 & 3 
HOWELLS Rhapsodic Quintet 
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS (arr. Gerigk) The Lark Ascending

The violin soars melodiously above the rest of the quartet in the gorgeous arrangement of Vaughan Williams’ most popular work The Lark Ascending, which concludes this concert of English music for clarinet and string quartet. Fantasies from the Baroque gems of Purcell’s Three-part Fantasias (arranged for string trio) to Imogen Holst’s Phantasy String Quartet sit alongside this perennial favourite and Holbrooke’s intoxicating depiction of a Scottish Island in a magical Celtic evocation for clarinet and strings.

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

ENSEMBLE 360

Ensemble 360

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Wednesday 13 March 2024, 8.00pm

Standard: £22.50-£25
Under 25s: Free

Past Event
Home› What's on› ENSEMBLE 360

MOZART Amadeus, Trio in E flat K498 Kegelstatt

Andante
Menuetto
Rondo. Allegretto

This is Mozart’s only trio for his three favourite instruments: clarinet, viola and piano. The nickname ‘Kegelstatt’ means ‘skittle alley’, and legend has it that Mozart wrote the work during a game of skittles. This may be far-fetched, especially given the rather noble character of the music, but what is certain is that he wrote the trio in Vienna, and entered it in his own thematic catalogue on 5 August 1786. The first movement is a marvellous example of Mozart’s invention at its most concentrated and unforced: every element in this sonata-form movement derives from the ornamental turn that is such a distinctive feature of the opening. The Minuet surprises by its almost grand character – no mere courtly dance, but something more imposing – and this is followed by an unhurried Rondo that brings this radiant work to a lyrical conclusion.

© Nigel Simeone

MOZART Wolfgang Amadeus, Clarinet Quintet in A K581

Allegro 
Larghetto 
Menuetto 
Allegretto con variazioni  

The Clarinet Quintet was completed on 29 September 1789 and written for Mozart’s friend Anton Stadler (1753–1812). The first performance took place a few months later at a concert in Vienna’s Burgtheater on 22 December 1789, with Stadler as the soloist in a programme where the premiere of the Clarinet Quintet was a musical interlude, sandwiched between the two parts of Vincenzo Righini’s cantata The Birth of Apollo, performed by “more than 180 persons.” 

From the start, Mozart is at his most daringly beautiful: the luxuriant voicing of the opening string chords provides a sensuously atmospheric musical springboard for the clarinet’s opening flourish. The rich sonority of the Clarinet Quintet is quite unlike that of any other chamber music by Mozart, but it does have something in common with his opera Così fan tutte (premièred in January 1790), on which he was working at the same time. In particular, the slow movement of the quintet, with muted strings supporting the clarinet, has a quiet rapture that recalls the trio ‘Soave sia il vento’ (with muted strings, and prominent clarinet parts as well as voices) in Così. The finale of the Quintet is a Theme and Variations which begins with folk-like charm, then turns to more melancholy reflection before ending in a spirit of bucolic delight. 

Nigel Simeone © 2012 

SCHUBERT Franz, Piano Quintet in A major D667, ‘The Trout’

Allegro vivace 
Andante 
Scherzo: Presto 
Theme and Variations: Andante 
Allegro giusto 
 

Silvester Paumgartner was a wealthy amateur cellist who lived in Steyr, Upper Austria, and an enthusiastic supporter of Schubert and his music. After playing Hummel’s Piano Quintet Paumgartner wanted a quintet for the same combination of instruments (violin, viola, cello, double bass and piano) from Schubert, who visited in the summer of 1819 (and again in 1823 and 1825). Paumgartner also wanted a work that included reference to Schubert’s song Die Forelle, The Trout, which had been composed in 1817. For Schubert, his visits to Paumgartner in the Upper Austrian countryside were a delight, a chance to make music, enjoy good company and revel in the spectacular scenery. 

 

Willi Kahl, writing in Cobbett’s Cyclopedic Survey of Chamber Music wrote that ‘the fundamental tone of the piece is defined by the persistence of a major key throughout’ – underlining that this is among Schubert’s most genial chamber works. The first movement is brilliant but never flashy while the Andante is the expressive core of the work, suggesting, Kahl believed, ‘a moonlit night-song from the Styrian landscape’. The Scherzo is muscular and energetic, with a more easy-going central Trio section. In the first three variations, the theme is heard in its original form (on a different instrument each time) and remains clearly recognisable in the more freely worked fourth and fifth variations. In the last variation, Schubert brings the Quintet back to the original song as the unmistakable figurations of the song’s piano accompaniment are heard for the first time, to utterly enchanting effect. The finale is amiable and untroubled (though not without a couple of surprises), bringing this most affable of works to a properly jubilant close. 

 

© Nigel Simeone  

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

THE CHIMPANZEES OF HAPPY TOWN

Ensemble 360 & Elinor Moran

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Wednesday 13 March 2024, 11.00am / 1.00pm

Please call 01908 280800 to book

Past Event
Home› What's on› THE CHIMPANZEES OF HAPPY TOWN

Paul Rissmann’s much-loved musical retelling of Giles Andreae and Guy Parker-Rees’s best-selling picture-book returns. Meet Chutney the Chimpanzee who, with one small act of planting a seed, transforms the lives of the entire town of Drabsville, and teaches its inhabitants to celebrate their differences and make life more colourful along the way!

With narration, visuals from the book and lots of music, this is brilliant first school/family concert for 3-7 year-olds. Before the concert why not buy the book, download the free participation pack, use the Learn the Songs YouTube videos and other learning and participation resources at: https://linktr.ee/mitr_learnin…

Free twilight teachers/educators INSET session for participating groups on Tuesday 6 February, 4.30-6pm. Contact education@stables.org for more information.

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

Elinor Moran

Elinor is in demand as a vocal workshop leader and animateur. She regularly works in learning and participation teams with such companies as ROH, ETO, Opera North, Snape Maltings, Garsington Opera and as far away as The Canadian Children’s Opera Chorus in Toronto.

Elinor has just returned from singing with André Rieu and his Johann Strauss Orchestra as a soloist on a world tour. She was a soloist on a SONY BMG recording “The Best Of Gilbert And Sullivan” which reached the top of the Classical Chart and can be heard on Blossom Street’s new Naxos recording of choral music by female composers “This Day”. Her recent roles include Mimi La Boheme (in the Olivier Award winning OperaUpClose production at the Soho Theatre and Charing Cross Theatre and Tour) and she has been the recipient of a Garsington Opera Chorus Award. 

Elinor studied voice at Chetham’s School Of Music and The Guildhall School of Music and Drama. In 2012 she performed a dance role in Danny Boyle’s Olympic Opening Ceremony but has since put away her hip hop shoes (until the right future opportunity…).

SOUNDS OF NOW: THE STRING QUARTETS OF ANNA MEREDITH

Ligeti Quartet

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Wednesday 18 October 2023, 8.00pm

Tickets:

£20.00 (including £2.50 commission)

Past Event
Home› What's on› SOUNDS OF NOW: THE STRING QUARTETS OF ANNA MEREDITH

Anna Meredith has achieved incredible success straddling multiple musical worlds, never compromising her raw, individual style. This concert tour promotes the Ligeti Quartet’s new album, Nuc, providing a survey of Meredith’s career to date, heard through her original works for string quartet. 

Nuc started life as a conversation between Anna Meredith and Richard Jones (Ligeti Quartet’s viola player) after realising that after a decade of frequently working together, they had almost an album’s worth of music. So an idea developed in which they would not only make the first studio recordings of Anna’s original music for string quartet, but that Richard would create new arrangements of existing tracks by Anna including from her award-winning electronic and dance albums.

The result is a joyful, occasionally furious, never too serious, energetic/restful collection of tracks which dazzle with Anna’s signature compulsive harmonies, rhythmic shifts of gear and sparkling textures.


Find out more and join the conversation here.

“One of the most innovative voices in contemporary British music.”

BachTrack

About the Artists

Ligeti Quartet

The ​Ligeti ​Quartet ​have ​been ​at ​the ​forefront ​of ​modern ​and ​contemporary ​music since ​their ​formation ​in ​2010. ​They ​have ​established ​a ​reputation ​as ​one ​of ​the ​UK’s leading ​ensembles, ​breaking ​new ​ground ​through ​innovative ​programming ​and championing ​of ​today’s ​most ​exciting ​composers ​and ​artists.

Find out more.

SIR SCALLYWAG & THE GOLDEN UNDERPANTS Schools concert

Ensemble 360 & Polly Ives

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Wednesday 8 March 2023, 11.00am / 1.00pm

 £7.50
 (Free teachers ticket with every 10 seats booked)

Past Event
Home› What's on› SIR SCALLYWAG & THE GOLDEN UNDERPANTS Schools concert

For ages 3-7 / Foundation/ Key Stage 1

When King Colin’s golden underpants go missing, it’s Sir Scallywag to the rescue! Brave and bold, courageous and true, he’s the perfect knight for the job… even if he is only six years old!

Original music by Music in the Round’s children’s Composer-in-Residence, Paul Rissmann, features instruments including strings, woodwind, and horn, presented together with story-telling and projected illustrations from the best-selling children’s book by Giles Andreae and Korky Paul.

Performed by the wonderfully dynamic and hugely engaging Ensemble 360 and Polly Ives, this concert is a great introduction

to live music for children. It’s full of wit, invention, songs and actions, and plenty of opportunities to join in.

Free twilight teachers/educators INSET session for participating groups on Tuesday 31 January, 4.30-6pm.
Contact education@stables.org for more information

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

Polly Ives

Polly Ives is one of the UK’s leading music educationalists with a varied portfolio as a concert presenter, narrator, promoter, workshop leader, trainer and cellist.

Polly believes that music should be accessible to everyone from birth and throughout people’s lives. Her career has focused on finding unique and creative ways to provide high-quality musical experiences for young children (particularly 0-8 year olds) and their wide and varied communities.

She regularly produces and presents children’s concerts (including with London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Mozart Players and Ensemble 360). She has worked with CBeebies, BBC Radio 3 and Scala Radio. Find out more. 

THE LARK ASCENDING

Ensemble 360

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Wednesday 8 March 2023, 8.00pm
Past Event
Home› What's on› THE LARK ASCENDING

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS The Lark Ascending for piano and violin (15′)
RAVEL String Quartet in F major (30′)
STANFORD Fantasy for Horn Quintet in A minor (12′)
VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Piano Quintet in C minor (30′)

Celebrating the 150th birthday of the celebrated composer who embodies the sound of English music. The evening opens with Vaughan Williams’ most famous work, The Lark Ascending, recently voted No.1 in the Classic FM Hall of Fame for a record 12th time, in its original version for piano and violin.

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Ralph, The Lark Ascending

Vaughan Williams began The Lark Ascending before the outbreak of the First World War, taking his inspiration from George Meredith’s 1881 poem of the same name. But he set this ‘Romance’ aside during the war and only finished it in 1920. The violinist Marie Hall gave the first performance of the original version for violin and piano in Shirehampton Public Hall (a district of Bristol) on 15 December 1920. Vaughan Williams dedicated the work to her, and she went on to give the premiere of the orchestral version six months later, when it was conducted by the young Adrian Boult at a concert in the Queen’s Hall in London. Free, serene and dream-like, this is idyllic music of rare and fragile beauty.

© Nigel Simeone

RAVEL Maurice, String Quartet in F

Allegro moderato. très doux
Assez vif. très rythmé
Très lent Vif et agité

The first two movements of Ravel’s Quartet were finished in December 1902 and the next month he submitted the first movement for a prize at the Paris Conservatoire, where he was still a student. The jury was unimpressed and the Director Théodore Dubois was typically acidic, claiming that it “lacked simplicity”. The failure to win a prize meant that Ravel’s studies with Fauré were over but Ravel persisted with the Quartet, and by April 1903 he had finished all four movements. He put it aside for yet another doomed attempt at the Prix de Rome, but it’s likely that he made further revisions later in the year. The pianist and composer Alfredo Casella recalled running into Ravel in the street in January 1904: “I found [Ravel] seated on a bench, attentively reading a manuscript. I asked him what it was. He said: It is a quartet I have just finished. I am rather pleased with it.” The first performance was given at the Schola Cantorum by the Heymann Quartet, on 5 March 1904. It is dedicated “à mon cher maître Gabriel Fauré”.

In a parallel with Debussy’s Quartet, Ravel makes use of cyclic themes – material heard in the first movement returns in various guises throughout. The second movement is notable for Ravel’s brilliant use of cross-rhythms as all four string players become a kind of gigantic guitar. The rhapsodic slow movement includes a dream-like recollection of the cyclic theme. In the finale, Ravel’s use of irregular time signatures generates a momentum that is not only impossible to predict but impossible to resist. Recollections of the cyclic theme are woven into the texture with great subtlety and the kaleidoscopic string writing produces a conclusion that glitters and surges.

Nigel Simeone © 2012

STANFORD Charles Villiers, Fantasy for Horn Quintet in A minor

In the 1890s Charles Villiers Stanford was the foremost English composer with an international reputation. But long before 1922 when he composed his Fantasy for Horn Quintet, his fame had been eclipsed by Edward Elgar, whose own success was in no small part down to Stanford – Elgar’s music had been included in a number of high-profile concerts conducted by Stanford. Stanford appears to have been badly affected by his younger colleagues success, and in 1904 they had a particularly spiteful fall-out via their regular correspondence.

As a result, Stanford became increasingly disillusioned with the English music scene. It is not known who the Fantasy for Horn Quintet was composed, or whether it ever received a public performance (though it may have been intended for students at the Royal College of Music). Like those quintets from Schumann and Liszt on which it may have been modled, it has a central theme, heard at the beginning in the cello and horn, which re-occurs as a foundation for other material.

VAUGHAN WILLIAMS Ralph, Quintet in C minor for violin, viola, cello, double bass and piano

Allegro con fuoco
Andante
Fantasia, quasi variazioni

This Quintet in C minor, scored for the same instrumentation as Schubert’s Trout, was composed in 1903 and revised twice before the first performance at the Aeolian Hall on 14 December 1905, but after a performance in 1918 it was withdrawn by Vaughan Williams. It was finally published in an edition by Bernard Benoliel a century after its composition. Vaughan Williams’s friend and biographer Michael Kennedy speaks of ‘the shadow of Brahms looming over’ the work, and this seems especially true of the expansive first movement. The expressive, romantic melody of the Andante second movement is more characteristic of its composer at this stage in his career, and it has some similarity to the song Silent Noon, composed the same year. The finale is a set of five variations, ending with a beautiful bell-like coda.

As Michael Kennedy observes, what matters with an early work such as this is not whether it anticipates Vaughan Williams’s later masterpieces (for the most part, it doesn’t), but that it is impressive in its own right. He does, however, make an intriguing observation: ‘Vaughan Williams may have withdrawn the Quintet but he did not forget it, for in 1954 he used the theme of the finale, slightly expanded, for the variations in the finale of his Violin Sonata.’

© Nigel Simeone

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

BRAHMS, RABL & ZEMLINSKY

Ensemble 360

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Thursday 17 March 2022, 8.00pm

Tickets: £20 / £16.50

Past Event
Home› What's on› BRAHMS, RABL & ZEMLINSKY

BRAHMS Violin Sonata No.2 in A minor
RABL Quartet in E-Flat minor
ZEMLINKSKY Clarinet Trio in D minor

Ensemble 360 return to The Stables with a sumptuous and sparkling concert of strings and clarinet repertoire. Opening with Brahms’s virtuosic sonata, the concert begins with lyricism, grace and warmth. The programme continues with two of the composers lesser known inheritors who crackle with fin-de-siècle verve: Rabl’s optimistic quartet is an overlooked gem of the chamber repertoire, by turns languid and vivacious. Closing with Zemlinksky’s passionate trio, this is a programme full of warmth and energy which concludes with an explosive flourish.

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

IZZY GIZMO

Ensemble 360 & Polly Ives

The Stables, Milton Keynes
Thursday 17 March 2022, 1.00pm

Tickets: £7.50

Past Event
Home› What's on› IZZY GIZMO

Schools/Family concert for ages 5 to 7/Key Stage 1 (Concert last approximately 50 minutes)

Join our quintet of musicians from Ensemble 360 and narrator Polly Ives for a children’s concert packed full of highly engaging live classical music, vivid story-telling, bright illustrations from the book and lots of audience participation.

Adapted from the popular picture book by Pip Jones and presented with Sara Ogilvie’s beautiful illustrations, this brilliant’s children’s story is brought to life in music and, for the first time, animation.

Izzy Gizmo is the story of a young inventor – and her long-suffering grandfather –whose magnificent inventions often malfunction. This participatory piece is full of memorable tunes and innovative instrumentation, with the musicians doubling on pots, pans, whistles and household items to recreate Izzy’s mechanical marvels and mischievous spirit.

Before the concert, why not buy the book, download the free participation pack and the Learn the Songs YouTube video from www.musicintheround.co.uk.

Learn the songs and download the free teachers pack before the concert at www.musicintheround. co.uk. The comprehensive cross-curricular digital resources covering music, literacy, numeracy – and, in the spirit of Izzy the intrepid inventor – an exploration of the creativity of STEM suitable for all.

Key Stage 1 Inset/CPD Session
Thursday 27 Jan 4.40-6.00pm at The Stables

Free for all teachers and practitioners bringing groups to the performance.

Contact education@stables.org for more information and to book a place

The session provides training, audio and visual resources, and practical support in how to incorporate the story and music into your school’s curriculum.

You’ll learn the songs (no singing experience required!), explore cross-curricular activities, develop your skills and confidence in making music and using music in general to support children’s development across the EYFS and National Curriculum. Led by Polly Ives (narrator/presenter for the Izzy Gizmo performance and early years music workshop leader and trainer). Teachers will receive a copy of the book and in-depth resources to take and use straight away in their sessions.

“Meets all the requirements of the NC with expert support and give your children the chance to hear and watch amazing musicians perform.” EY Music Curriculum Leader

About the Artists

Members of Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

Polly Ives

Polly Ives is one of the UK’s leading music educationalists with a varied portfolio as a concert presenter, narrator, promoter, workshop leader, trainer and cellist.

Polly believes that music should be accessible to everyone from birth and throughout people’s lives. Her career has focused on finding unique and creative ways to provide high-quality musical experiences for young children (particularly 0-8 year olds) and their wide and varied communities.

She regularly produces and presents children’s concerts (including with London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Mozart Players and Ensemble 360). She has worked with CBeebies, BBC Radio 3 and Scala Radio. Find out more.