Orchestra of St John

The Orchestra of St John was formed to extend the well-established music tradition at St John’s Church in Bromsgrove. Many of those invited to perform with us are local musicians, who are exemplars of the quality of local music-making and the breadth of talent within our own community. Younger players of a high standard are especially encouraged, to give them opportunities to build their experience for their future music making as well as to broaden the strengths of the Orchestra.

Richard Jenkinson, the Orchestra’s Music Director, has been closely involved with the development of the Orchestra since its formation in 2011 and continues to drive the quality of performance as well as creating ambitious performance ideas for the future.

The Orchestra gives four concerts in St John’s Church each year and has now staged four very successful St John MusicFests. These have included a diverse mix of orchestral, jazz and chamber music. In September 2013 we performed an ambitious programme of operatic highlights and included three works by Wagner for the Wagner 200 anniversary.
OSJ spirit of Bromsgrove award
Richard Jenkinson
For OSJ reviews click here
We were delighted to be awarded ‘Most Promising Newcomer Organisation’ in the 2014 Spirit of Bromsgrove Awards. Concerts in 2015 included our fourthchoral concert with a perforamnce of the full version of Messiah, and the exciting MusicFest, continuing our Beethoven cycle with Benjamin Frith in the Emperor concerto. This provided a very fitting conclusion to the successful Bromsgrove Festival and was awarded another Four Star review in the Birmingham Post.