The Lark Ascending: we have lift-off!

Jennifer Pike (photo by Tomasz Jurek)

We’re delighted to have received an Arts Council National Lottery Project grant towards our celebration of the centenary of the first performance of Vaughan Williams’ The Lark Ascending. This is on top of a grant from the Vaughan Williams Charitable Trust, for which we are very grateful.

We’re excited to be joined by violinist Jennifer Pike, who will play the work with us at Shirehampton Public Hall on 15th December 2020 – exactly 100 years after Marie Hall gave the premiere there in the presence of the composer.

Although we have been planning this for some time, the COVID-19 pandemic has prevented any progress over the summer, and has forced us to rethink a few things. Now that we have secure funding, detailed planning will take place over the coming weeks. The current plan is for a combination of live and online events, plus talks and articles. The concert on 15 December will be a shorter version of the original programme from 1920. In addition our Preludes team will be running a multi-faceted Lark-themed project in several schools in the Shirehampton area, looking at both the music and George Meredith’s poem that inspired it, and incorporating music, art and poetry.

We’re looking forward to working with Jennifer Pike, Shirehampton Public Hall, Kings Weston House, Bristol Beacon, the schools and all of the musicians, tutors, technicians and others who will help to make this an exciting – and much-needed – celebration of one of the nation’s favourite pieces of music.

Keep an eye on our website and social media for further details as our plans develop over the next few weeks.