Name: APO Winter Concert 2025
Start: 2025-02-15T19:30:00+00:00
Location: Great Hall - University of Reading

Reading's Aldworth Philharmonic Orchestra will return to the Great Hall on the University of Reading’s London Road Campus for a concert of superb music featuring a prominent role for solo piano in every single piece, on Saturday 15th February, 2025, 7.30pm.

The pianist charged with taking on such a daunting challenge is the brilliant Semra Kurutaç, who was the orchestra’s first ever soloist over 22 years ago and who has returned many times to wow APO’s audiences. She’ll be performing two devilishly difficult solo works which are both sets of variations of famous melodies. Firstly, George Gershwin’s own jazzy variations on I Got Rhythm, then Polish composer Witold Lutosławski’s variations on the instantly-recognisable Caprice No. 24 by Niccolò Paganini.
As if this wasn’t enough for Semra, the two solo pieces are bookended by two pieces which have significant orchestral piano parts. Both are evocations of scenes from iconic settings. The concert opens with Aaron Copland’s Four Dance Episodes from Rodeo, which takes us to the Wild West - including the famous hootin’ tootin’ Rodeo. At the other end of the programme we’re taken on a tour of Rome, with four scenes linked by pine trees in the surroundings, in Ottorino Respighi’s The Pines of Rome. The spectacular ending depicting a Roman legion marching under the pines of the Appian way is one of the most epic musical conclusions you’ll ever hear.
Tickets are £15 for 18+, £10 for under 18s. All can be purchased from the APO website: www.apo.org/next-event, or by clicking the link provided in this event listing.
Members of APO’s free fan club for 5-15 year olds, APO Young, get a special price of just £7. At 4.30pm on the concert day, APO Young members will be offered the opportunity to come in and watch the end of the final rehearsal, during which the conductor, Andrew, will explain what’s happening in the music. There’ll be a chance to meet some of the musicians and also members of Reading Youth Orchestra, afterwards, too.
As ever, APO’s famous ‘Concert Virgin’ scheme offers free tickets, no questions asked, to anyone who’s never heard a live orchestra perform. These can also be reserved from the APO website.