A large music ensemble that has outgrown most venues in Lanarkshire will be performing a special festive concert later this year in a Rutherglen church.
The Lanarkshire Cecilian Orchestra has grown over the last few years and is now 60-strong, attracting ever-growing audiences and has discovered it’s increasingly difficult to find stages suitable to accommodate it.
The orchestra holds three concerts a year and will be bringing its annual Christmas concert to Stonelaw Parish Church, the others are in spring and summer.
Founded in Blantyre in 1956, the orchestra is now a registered charity and took its name from Saint Cecilian – the patron saint of music.
The orchestra is led by a trio of professional musicians. Martin Barnett, Caitlin Hollinger, and Mark Wilson.
Martin is President of the orchestra, studied at Edinburgh Napier University and the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. He is also Director of the Glasgow Viol Consort.
Caitlin , a graduate in violin and conducting from Edinburgh Napier University, is also the Musical Director of the Wee Sing Community Choir in East Kilbride. She is celebrating 10 years as Musical Director and conducts the orchestra.
Mark, the orchestra leader and principal violin, studied the instrument at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music and Drama and the Royal Academy of Music in London, before becoming concertmaster of the Orquestra do Estado de Mato Grosso in Brazil.
Wendy Thorley-Ryder, bassoonist and the orchestra’s media officer, said: “We have musicians from all over but the majority are from Lanarkshire, including a few from Cambuslang.
“This will be our first outing to Rutherglen. We’ve outgrown a lot of venues as we’ve become a bigger orchestra and we have a bigger choir that joins us at Christmas so it can be difficult to accommodate us.
“We used to hold concerts at the Glow Centre in Motherwell, then a church in East Kilbride, but we’ve outgrown them.
“Years ago we were lucky if you had 20 players now we’re hitting 60 and the Wee Sing Community Choir is 70-strong. Hopefully we can have concerts at Stonelaw in the future as well, as there’s nowhere else in central Lanarkshire that we can fit in.”
Lanarkshire’s only amateur orchestra is a registered charity and they perform a wide repertoire of music, including chamber music, classical, light classical, shows and film music.
Recent light concerts have focussed on film music and musicals with items ranging from Pirates of the Caribbean and Star Trek to West Side Story, Chicago and Jesus Christ, Superstar.
Classical repertoire has included Schubert and Mendelssohn symphonies and concertos by Mozart, Beethoven and Vivaldi.
If you’d consider joining the orchestra, you can message the Secretary through their Facebook page.
Tickets for the concert at Stonelaw Church, 2 Dryburgh Ave, including booking fees they are priced at £13.70 and £10.46 for concessions (students and pensioners).
They are available at: www.eventbrite.co.uk/o/lanarkshire-cecilian-orchestra-59468857283
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