Rochdale Amateur Light Orchestra concert with Daphne Duo

Oscar Tabor and Marcus Forster: Daphne Duo

Rochdale Amateur Light Orchestra gave a concert in St Michael’s Church, Bamford, on Wednesday, 21 November including two children’s favourites, The Teddy Bears’ Picnic and The Parade of the Tin Soldiers which brought back happy memories for quite a number of the appreciative audience.

There was also a piece focusing on the string section: Pizzicato obbligato, a movement from the Durham Days‘s 1957-63 by the orchestra’s founder and conductor, Graham Marshall, who is a graduate in Music from Durham University and who recently become an octogenarian but is still active composing and conducting.

During the evening there were two opportunities for everyone to enjoy the combined efforts of two young and accomplished musicians, Oscar Tabor (violin) and Marcus Forster (guitar). They constitute the group: Daphne Duo, and are available for hire for wedding receptions and other occasions as well as concert performances!

They played several movements from Piazzzolla’s ‘L’Histoire du tango” and the Sonata Concertata of Paganini.

With obvious skill and delight in the contribution they were making, they demonstrated a great talent for engaging the audience in the colourful music they played, and showed that violin and guitar can provide a very successful music-making pairing.

Other music played by the orchestra included an arrangement of an aria from Honegger’s operetta, Les aventures du roi Pausole, and four movements from the Water Music Suites of Handel.

These rounded off another concert evening given, free of charge, by the players who form our local orchestra dedicated to rehearsing and performing music of a light-hearted nature. Their motto is ‘making music from the heart’.

Anyone interested in joining the group will find details on its website:

• www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/sites/the-rochdale-light-orchestra