Two of our members are here to tell you about our year-end performance in September 2021. Elsa reflects on this as the culmination of her time at RYO, and Hannah describes the performance in more detail below. – By Elsa Crook, Cello I joined RYO at the beginning of 2019 at the encouragement of my […]
End of year performance 2021 Read More »
One of the pieces we are learning this year is the English Folk Song Suite by Ralph Vaughan Williams, arranged by Gordon Jacobs. There have been some fantastic musicians who helped preserve folk songs, including Percy Grainger, Cecil Sharp, and Ralph Vaughan Williams himself, and this piece is a great example – a joyous medley
Getting to know English Folk Songs Read More »
After rather unusual 2019-20 and 2020-21 seasons, we all have our fingers crossed that this year will be a bit more normal! Making us feel even more excited about the start of a new year is our new rehearsal venue at St Joseph’s College, in their lovely College Hall. We restart on Friday 17th September
2021-22 season starts Friday 17th September Read More »
– By Abbey Hardy, Daniel Hobart and Pippa Moore Today we (along with the invaluable contribution of Bernie the dog) have been hard at work digitalising our archives and setting up the brand new RYO website! We’ve spent the day playing detective tracing back loose photographs, pouring over endless programmes, and abusing Mel’s poor scanner.
Building our new website Read More »
– By Abbey Hardy Over the summer holidays (August 2021) members of RYO participated in three online workshop sessions of Mayer’s Faust Overture to celebrate the works of female composers. Although the piece was intimidating at first, members were excited by the challenge the music posed, growing to confidence by the end of the series.
Mayer Faust Overture Workshops Read More »
– By Pippa Moore 14 months and many Zoom rehearsals later, RYO was finally able to welcome back its members in person for a full live rehearsal in June 2021; it was nice to have the full orchestra together at last. Although strange at first, over the following weeks we all made the adjustment back
The Return of Live Rehearsals Read More »
– By Daniel Hobart and Abbey Hardy This was our first rehearsal back after lockdown. After a while apart we were finally able to meet up with our wind players, and a week later our strings to run a couple of sectionals. We were excited to play through some of the music we worked on
May sectionals 2021 Read More »
– By Daniel Hobart Spanning from March 2020 to May 2021, the past year of RYO has been dominated by Zoom rehearsals. Although far from ideal, rather than admitting defeat, RYO used this as an opportunity to explore a wider range of music than usual, focusing on a total of 11 pieces across that same
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A brief history of RYO’s conductors and leaders. Robert Roscoe, 30 April 1994, St John’s Smith Square Conductors of the Reading Youth Orchestra 1944 – 49 Humphrey Hare 1950 – 52 Mark Wigram 1952 – 54 John Russel 1954 – 74 Edward Underhill 1974 – 76 Roy Goodman 1976 – 97 Robert Roscoe 1997 –
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