AIREDALE Symphony Orchestra conducted by John Anderson will be performing their annual summer concert in the King’s Hall, Ilkley, on Sunday 30 June at 7.30pm.

The programme features works by Wagner, Weber and Berlioz.

The famous Prelude and Liebestod (Love Death) from Wagner’s opera Tristan und Isolde opens the programme.

After mistakenly drinking a love potion, Tristan and Isolde declare their love for one another and are lost in secret ecstasy and bliss.

Wagner’s sumptuous music captures the essence of their hopes, desires and love, which can only be truly fulfilled when they are united in death.

ASO’s principal bassoonist, Rosemary Anderson (pictured above), will be the soloist in Carl Maria von Weber’s Bassoon Concerto in F. Composed in 1811 (in less than two weeks!) this concerto fully captures the bassoon’s versatility and range.

Weber was best known as a composer of opera and in the slow movement he returns to his operatic roots, writing one of the most beautiful melodies for the solo bassoon, comparable with certain slow soprano arias from his operas.

The final work in the programme is Hector Berlioz’s wonderful Symphonie Fantastique, which was premiered in Paris in 1830 and written when Berlioz was a 26 year old student at the Paris Conservatory.

The symphony depicts Berlioz’s passionate love for the actress Harriet Smithson and on seeing her performance in Romeo and Juliet, he declared “I shall marry that woman and on that drama I will write my greatest symphony”.

The work includes the famous March to the Scaffold and Dream of a Witches’ Sabbath. Berlioz writes for a huge orchestra including 2 harps and 4 timpanists - not to be missed!