Hans Zimmer by candlelight at Dorchester Abbey

If you have a soft spot for film scores, there is a candlelit evening worth the short trip south of Oxford. On Thursday 12 November, Dorchester Abbey hosts 'The Best of Hans Zimmer & Film Favourites Illuminated', a live performance by the Illuminated Orchestra that pairs a chamber orchestra with a light show inside the medieval church. The abbey sits in Dorchester on Thames, about eight miles south-east of Oxford, and it is exactly the kind of place that makes a concert like this work.

The programme leans on the big names. You will hear music from Interstellar, Gladiator, Dune, Harry Potter, Jurassic Park, Star Wars, Inception, The Lion King, James Bond and Titanic, all performed live rather than played from a recording. The Illuminated Orchestra is built around this format, touring internationally and turning soundtracks into immersive performances by combining musicianship with dramatic lighting in historic venues. The whole thing runs to about 80 minutes, so it is a contained evening rather than a marathon.

There are two sessions on the night, which is worth knowing before you commit. The early concert is at 5.45pm and the late one at 8.15pm, and tickets for each are sold separately through Eventbrite. The early session is already marked as almost full, and the late one is selling fast, so it is worth sorting yours sooner rather than later. Doors for the late concert open at 7.30pm, it starts at 8.15pm and wraps up around 9.30pm.

The venue itself is half the draw. Dorchester Abbey, the Abbey Church of St Peter and St Paul, was founded in 1140 by Alexander, Bishop of Lincoln, for the Arrouaisian Order of Augustinian Canons Regular, and it stands on the site of an earlier Saxon cathedral. Its architecture is a bit of a tour of English Gothic: the north transept and its door are Norman, the north side of the nave and the choir arch are early English Gothic, the choir and south aisle are Decorated Gothic, and the south porch is late Perpendicular. The sanctuary dates from 1330 and holds the famous Jesse Tree east window, along with carved sedilia and a piscina. The tower was rebuilt in 1602, and the abbey has gone through a series of restorations over the centuries under architects including Sir George Gilbert Scott. It is also a working parish church, open every day from 8am until dusk, and it has a surprising musical pedigree: Radiohead recorded the orchestral sections of Kid A and Amnesiac here.

As for the man behind the music, Hans Zimmer has been scoring films since the 1980s and has more than a hundred soundtracks to his name, with The Lion King and Dune earning him two Academy Awards. He is known for blending electronic sounds with traditional orchestral arrangements, and his work has taken him from the studio to the top of the industry, where he heads the film music division at DreamWorks. Whether you are there for the music or the building, the combination of the two is what makes this one worth the trip.