A concert by the BBC National Orchestra of Wales conducted by Ryan Bancroft, featuring Ravel, Vaughan Williams and Sibelius, with baritone Steffan Lloyd Owen.
Ryan Bancroft takes the podium at BBC Hoddinott Hall on Wednesday 11 November, leading the BBC National Orchestra of Wales through a programme they've titled War and Peace. It's a night built around music of remembrance and journey, and it brings together three very different composers—Ravel, Vaughan Williams and Sibelius—under one roof.
The evening opens with Maurice Ravel's Le tombeau de Couperin. Originally written as a series of piano pieces in 1917, Ravel later reimagined it for orchestra, and the result is a set of Baroque dance forms refracted through glittering colour and delicately layered sound. It's a refined, polished start that sets a certain mood before the programme shifts gear.
From there, the focus turns to the voice. Baritone Steffan Lloyd Owen joins the orchestra for Ralph Vaughan Williams's Songs of Travel, a cycle shaped by folk song and hymn-like warmth. It's the most intimate part of the night, with the baritone taking centre stage for a set of songs that lean into that particular English pastoral tradition. After that, the programme heads north with Jean Sibelius's Symphony No. 1 in E minor. Premiered in 1899, it opens with a brooding clarinet that gives way to bold drama, with echoes of Tchaikovsky's lyricism and Romantic intensity. It builds through a hammering scherzo and a finale of stirring force, and it's the biggest work of the three, so it makes sense as the closer.
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The whole thing is part of the BBC NOW 2026-27 season, so it's one night in a wider run of concerts. A few practical bits to keep in mind: there's an age guidance of no under-2s, and all under-16s have to be seated with an adult aged 18 or over. If you need them, there are four wheelchair and companion seats available in Row O. The concert starts at 7.30pm at BBC Hoddinott Hall in Cardiff.
