To celebrate their 40th anniversary, the Apollo Saxophone Quartet presents a programme of new commissions, (including from the pen of Sandbach resident Claire Cope!) alongside their brand new Vintage Cartoon project; three early cartoons from the Silly Symphonies, Merry Melodies and Looney Tunes era, with the original scores painstakingly restored and rescored for saxophone quartet by the members of the quartet, played live to the cartoons.
“Glorious music….superbly performed by the Apollo Saxophone Quartet” Sunday Express
5:00pm Pre-concert Early Bird meal at La Casa Mia (not included in the ticket)
Why not make an evening of it and book your pre-concert dinner at La Casa Mia who are kindly helping to sponsor the concert series
Programme
6:30pm Doors open
7:00: Spotlight Concert
Music performed by talented young people from Sandbach
7:30 Intermission
Art Exhibition by Sue Jones from Sandbach Art Club, Refreshments
8:00 Main Concert
The APOLLO SAXOPHONE QUARTET has been at the forefront of the UK contemporary music scene for forty years, and has without doubt made the largest single contribution to the repertoire for Saxophone Quartet in the UK, commissioning and premiering well over one hundred works, many of which are now considered core repertoire and are performed by Saxophone Quartets worldwide. This includes significant works from Sir Richard Rodney Bennett, Michael Torke, Michael Nyman, Graham Fitkin, Will Gregory, Dominic Muldowney, Keith Tippett, Django Bates, Barbara Thompson, Joby Talbot, Bob Mintzer, Kenny Wheeler, Eddie Parker, Barry Guy, to name but a few, ranging from quartets to concerti with orchestras.
The group has devised several highly successful collaborative projects, including a hugely popular and successful series of original scores to black and white film, and performance projects with poet, dancers, multi-media and strings. The quartet has recorded nine CDs of commissioned repertoire to date, including a DECCA (Argo) CD that topped at no.3 in the UK classical charts, and their latest release CONTINUUM, released in May 2024 in the lead up to the groups 40th anniversary in 2025.
Formed in 1985 at the RNCM, where they became the first group to receive Distinction in the college’s Professional Performance Diploma (the RNCM’s highest honour at the time), the quartet went on to achieve competition success in the Royal Over-Seas League Chamber Music Competition, Park Lane Group Competition, Tunnell Trust Young Artists Scheme, Countess of Munster, Tillet Trust in the UK and the Erasmus Concours in Holland, culminating in First Prize and Outstanding Performance Award at the 1992 Tokyo International Chamber Music Competition. The Quartet were also invited to join Sir Yehudi Menuhin’s Live Music Now scheme, where they were major contributors for almost ten years.
The group has since toured extensively, including concerts tours in Japan, South Africa, most of Europe, and the UK. Looking forward, the quartet has recently premiered a new performance project with the Dutch jazz-inspired Artvark Saxophone Quartet, (with whom they first collaborated in 2014 as part of their South Africa tour), which was released on CD in the Spring of 2019, and now tours across Europe. Future plans include an album of three commissioned concerti for saxophone quartet and strings with the RLPO, and a tour of the UK and beyond in the 25/26 season revisiting some of the significant commissions that the group has brought into being, alongside new works from the current season’s commissions, to celebrate the group’s 40th anniversary.
The ASQ has always thrived by creating the sound world in which it operates, always innovating, always leading, always moving on to the next project without looking back, and the future is set to continue in the same vein.