A good start for new talent

STUDENTS of the London College of Music and Media came together to give an end-of-year performance conducted by Andrew Zolinsky, and displayed enough talent to see them through the often rocky first years of being a professional musician, writes Jane Wild.
The free early evening concert was part of the London Festival of Contemporary Church Music, and while it was otherwise a fine programme, the selected works bore slight relation to the title of the festival.
Vaughn Williams’s Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis is an unusual piece in that it is written for a string orchestra whose members drop out in some sections to leave just a string quartet.
Tutor and leader of the string ensemble, violinist Susanne Stanzeleit, had a strong reedy tone that has earned her much high-profile playing work.
Bright trumpet playing from Jonas Brolin, a masters student at LCMM was added to the string sound in Arvo Pärt’s Concerto Piccolo über B-A-C-H.
Shostakovich’s Chamber Symphony ended the concert with gusto and ambition in plenty.