Katherine Baker, flute, and Lucy Wakeford, harp, with Northern Chamber Orchestra

Mendelssohn String Symphony No 10 | Mozart Concerto for flute and harp | Debussy Danse sacrée et danse profane | Fauré Fantasy for flute and orchestra | Haydn Symphony No 39

The Northern Chamber Orchestra's first concert of the New Year brings a programme sure to beat the January blues with music of deftness of touch and warm sonorities. They begin the concert with a Mendelssohn sinfonia for strings in B minor, the one-movement no 10. This work by the 14-year-old composer, was considered to be lost until it was discovered in a Berlin library at the end of WWII. The effervescent conclusion of the work leads them into a most charming and joyous concerto, Mozart's flute and harp, played by two stars of the UK classical music scene, Katherine Baker and Lucy Wakeford. After the interval the two soloists return individually to each play a short French masterpiece; Debussy first, then Fauré. They close the concert with one of Haydn's great and perhaps underperformed early symphonies, the G minor, no 39.