JOIN Ripon’s St Cecilia Orchestra and more than 150 school children in Ripon Cathedral this month to experience the Magic of Music.

Presented in association with Ripon Cathedral on on Saturday, January 20, and with an early start time of 6.30pm to aid access for younger children, the concert programme includes Dukas’ The Sorcerer’s Apprentice (perhaps best known to many for its place in Disney’s Fantasia soundtrack) and John Adams’ five-minute whirlwind of a piece: Short Ride in a Fast Machine.

Expect to see an appearance from a collection of vacuum cleaners and a floor polisher in Malcolm Arnold’s comedic masterpiece, A Grand Grand Festival Overture, and then sit back and enjoy a musical retelling of the Musicians of Bremen – a Brothers Grimm tale, set to music by Richard Shephard and narrated on this occasion by John Forsyth, also compère for the evening.

The highlight of the concert, though, is the bringing together of more than 150 school children from Ripon, Harrogate and Teesside, to sing with St Cecilia Orchestra in Gary Carpenter’s The Lamplighter – an atmospheric and characterful work based on the poems of Robert Louis Stevenson – and movements from Andrew Carter’s Benedicite.

John Forsyth, who was awarded an MBE in 2011 for his services to music and music education and has a long connection with the Lamplighter, having been involved in its recording in 1998 with the Tees Valley Youth Choir, is looking forward to the performance and is a firm believer in the need for children to experience music first-hand:

He said: "There are many ways of helping children and young people to understand the beauty of music, but one way stands out above all others and that is, to give them first hand, a high-quality experience and involvement in music-making. The concert at Ripon Cathedral is such an event."

"Xenophon Kelsey and the St Cecilia Orchestra are to be congratulated for having the wisdom to create such an event for our young people. To perform in such an historic and beautiful building is something, I’m sure, that will inspire them as they continue to explore music throughout their lives.”

Tickets for the concert, priced at £18 for adults and free for under-18s, are available online via Ticketsource (www.ticketsource.co.uk/st-cecilia), from the Harrogate Theatre box office, the Little Ripon Bookshop and on the door.