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Founded in 1967 by trumpeter and arranger Syd Lawrence, The fabulous SYD LAWRENCE ORCHESTRA has been thrilling audiences in Concert Halls, Theatres, TV Shows and Music Festivals all over Great Britain and Continental Europe for over 40 years.

Renowned for it’s exciting blend of high octane Big Band Swing and Classic Dance Music, the Orchestra’s repertoire ranges from the wartime million sellers of the legendary Glenn Miller through the era of the great Count Basie Orchestra to the hit songs of Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald.

For someone who has starred in the West End as Jean Valjean in Les Miserables and as the iconic Phantom in The Phantom of the Opera, including the 25th anniversary spectacular at the Royal Albert Hall and at The Royal Variety Show, as well as creating the role of the Phantom in Love Never Dies, Ramin Karimloo doesn’t look like your average Olivier-nominated musical theatre superstar.
With an arm full of tattoos - everything from trees to angels to poetry - a trilby straight from Shoreditch and a huge on-trend jumper he bagged from a fashion shoot, he looks more like someone from Red Hot Chilli Peppers that you never noticed before. Except you would have noticed him: the man is stunning, with looks somewhere between Latin matinee idol and ruggedly handsome Brando-esque actor.
And if he doesn’t look like a musical theatre star then that’s just as it should be. Musical theatre stars don’t usually have their own bluegrass bands, idolize ‘proper’ actors like Daniel Day Lewis and Robert DeNiro, write their own songs or play the guitar, something he learned between matinees and evening performances of Phantom of the Opera, when it wasn’t worth taking the make-up off only to put it on again. He also plays banjo and piano, but claims not to be a musician.

Lorin Maazel, born 6th. March, 1930, is a conductor, violinist and composer. Lorin Maazel was born to Jewish-French parents in Neuilly-sur-Seine in France and brought up in the USA. Raised by a musical family, Lorin Maazel was a prodigy, taking his first conducting lesson at the age of 7 and making his conducting debut at the age of 8! At 11 he guest conducted the NBC Symphony Orchestra on the radio. At the age of 12 he toured America to conduct major orchestras. He made his violin debut at the age of 15. He later studied at the University of Pittsburgh.

Plymouth’s own Symphony Orchestra has been central to the musical life of the city for 134 years, and continues to perform challenging music ranging from the traditional to the contemporary.

In 1875 a local teacher of music, Dr Samuel Weekes, brought together a group of musician friends and founded what was then known as an Orchestral Society: their first concert was presented in the graceful Tea Rooms of Plymouth’s old Royal Hotel. The renamed Plymouth Symphony Orchestra can claim to be one of the longest-established orchestras in the country, with an amazing record of continuity: the founding conductor was succeeded by his son; his grandson, John Weekes, was a vice-president until recently! The present conductor, Anne Kimber, is only the sixth in 134 years.

The eighty members of the orchestra travel from as far afield as Beer and Bodmin to attend weekly rehearsals, although none receive payment for playing in the orchestra.

In its choice of programmes the orchestra aims to achieve a balance between established masterpieces and an adventurous selection of less familiar music. Among the contemporary pieces performed in recent years have been several specially commissioned from local composers, including Judy Whitlock, who leads the double bass section.