The Hallé – Saint-Saëns’ Organ Symphony at The Bridgewater Hall

Fauré Pavane
Poulenc Organ Concerto
Dobrinka Tabakova Sanctus – Chorale for solo organ
Saint-Saëns Symphony No.3, ‘Organ Symphony’

Corinna Niemeyer conductor
Anna Lapwood organ

In her debut with the Hallé, German conductor Corinna Niemeyer, Artistic and Music Director of the Orchestre de Chambre du Luxembourg, conducts French music, beginning with Fauré’s delicate Pavane bringing to mind a painting by Fragonard with graceful courtesans decked in elegant 18th-century costumes. Still in her twenties, Anna Lapwood, is firmly established as a leading organist, conductor and broadcaster, who made her combined Hallé and BBC Proms debut in 2021 with Saint-Saëns’s Third, so called ‘Organ’, Symphony. For her first Manchester Hallé visit, she also plays Poulenc’s eclectic concerto which veers in mood from jocularity and light-heartedness to the grave and profound, reflecting his rediscovery of his Christian faith around this time. Anna also plays a work composed especially for her, Sanctus from Dobrinka Tabakova’s Orbis Factor.