World-famous cellist Raphael Wallfisch will join members of the Cheltenham Symphony Orchestra when they perform at the Cheltenham Town Hall this Saturday.

There will be a quintessentially English feel to the concert on Saturday evening, which is titled ‘Last Night of the Proms’. Music from Edward Elgar forms the centrepiece of the concert with Raphael Wallfisch leading the way as he performs Elgar’s Cello Concerto. David Banks, Chairman of the orchestra, is excited to welcome such a famous musician to the regency town.

He said: “We’re absolutely thrilled that a musician of Raphael’s calibre will be performing with us on Saturday. It’s a huge honour to welcome him to Cheltenham, I’m sure the audience will appreciate his incredible talent. Our conductor, David Curtis, has worked with Raphael before, and he made the approach on our behalf. We were all tremendously excited when he accepted our invitation, it promises to be a special evening.”

As well as playing several of Elgar’s most famous pieces, the orchestra will also be playing Frederick Delius’ ‘A Song Before Sunrise’ and Sir Henry Wood’s ‘Fantasia on British Sea Songs’. The epic ‘Jerusalem’, written by Sir Hubert Parry, will also be covered on what promises to be a night of celebration for English music. David continued: “It will be a wonderful occasion, it always is when you get an opportunity to perform with such a talented group of musicians. Rehearsals are always fun but performing in front of a big crowd is a wonderful feeling, you always get a notable lift in performance at a concert, everyone rises to the occasion.”

David, who plays the violin, has been a part of the orchestra for 15 years. He continued: “A lot of our members have been involved for a long time, there’s many that have been involved for a lot longer than me. It’s a great joy to be part of such a passionate and knowledgeable group of musicians. We’re very fortunate to have some fantastic buildings in Gloucestershire that we often play at. We use the Pittville Pump Room a lot, it’s always a privilege to play there. The Town Hall is another venue we’re familiar with, it’s a great space to play in for a sizeable orchestra, we’re looking forward to playing there again this Saturday.

“We’ve been fortunate to have played many memorable concerts. One performance that I will always treasure was when we accompanied Rick Wakeman in The Centaur building at Cheltenham Racecourse. That was a big concert, there was a choir, a full symphony orchestra plus an audience of over 2000 people. As an amateur orchestra it’s very exciting to be playing at venues like that, you get quite a buzz.”

Plans are already in place for the 2018/2019 programme, with a very special piece of music planned for a concert next June. David explained: “Next year we’ll be celebrating our 50th anniversary which we’re all looking to. At our anniversary concert we’ll be playing Mozart’s Piano Concerto, the very first piece that the Cheltenham Symphony Orchestra played at the first concert five decades ago.

“We started off as a small chamber group, it’s nice to see how far we’ve come since the early days.”

The concert at Cheltenham Town Hall gets underway at 7.30pm this Saturday.