Our music community is invited to join us for a FREE concert by the Regional Youth Orchestra (RYO) NSW, which will include a performance by our very own Powell Orchestra.

The RYO NSW (conducted by their Artistic Director Mr Patrick Brennan) will be performing Nimrod from the Enigma Variations and a selection from Scheherazade by Rimsky Korsakov. We promise this free concert will delight audiences both young and old.

Edward Elgar’s Nimrod from the ‘Enigma’ Variations will be familiar to classical music lovers, as the solemn and tear-jerking melody often played at funeral and memorial services. Crowned the greatest piece of British classical music this year by UK Classic FM, Nimrod has been played at King Charles’ coronation to the 2012 Olympics.

In 2023 RYO NSW has performed with musicians from London Symphony Orchestra and Sydney Symphony Orchestra.
After their visit to Wollongong, the orchestra will perform with members of the Australian World Orchestra at the Eugene Goossens Hall in Sydney.

We are also excited to include in the line-up WollCon’s Powell String Orchestra. Conducted by Tanya Phillips, the orchestra will open the concert with a new work by Australian composer Bruce Lawrence, ‘The Illawarra Suite’.

It has become a favourite at British cultural events and celebrations, and an adaptation of it also appears at the ending of the 2017 film Dunkirk.

While the music of Scheherazade showcases Rimsky-Korsakov’s mastery as an orchestrator, in terms of the pure, sensory pleasure of sound. It is a vivid orchestral work inspired by the tales of the Arabian Nights.