Sala: University Church of St Mary the Virgin, Oxford

A rare performance of Bruckner's Overture in G minor introduces luminous Wagner and lively Beethoven from the Hertford Bruckner Orchestra. 

The refurbishment of the University Church of St Mary the Virgin, Oxford, has been completed and it is now, once again, a glorious concert venue, well suited to the performance of a Bruckner symphony. The audience sit in the nave, the orchestra in front of them with the substantial stone organ screen that separates the nave from the chancel as an evocative backdrop.

The Hertford Bruckner Orchestra is really quite an extraordinary phenomenon. It is an ensemble of mainly amateur musicians, centred round Hertford College, Oxford but involving players from the University, the city and elsewhere in the UK – founded principally to perform the symphonies of Anton Bruckner! His symphonies are rarely played outside the professional circuit, so the HBO welcomes anyon