This Mother’s Day, Bay of Plenty Symphonia welcomes Lara Hall as soloist in Beethoven’s Violin Concerto.

Asked what inspired her to play, Hall replied: “My parents learnt through reading a newspaper article that preschoolers could play violin and asked me if I’d like to learn.

“I’d seen both my mother and grandfather play violin, loved seeing family music-making and always took up the opportunity to do anything new and exciting – so of course I said: ‘Yes!’”

Hall has a special musical connection to Tauranga through violin teacher Val Thorburn, “who taught me as a young child; then again from age 10 until I commenced university study at 16”.

“She is inspirational in that she has a wonderful passion for music and always demonstrated with a gorgeous warm sound in her lessons. My lessons with Val were in Auckland, but she moved to Tauranga about 25 years ago.”

Hall, who now teaches violin at the University of Waikato, has received students from Thorburn. “Amelia Taylor and Shelby Hancox are professional violinists living in Tauranga who learnt from both Val and me.”

She enjoys playing concertos because they usually have parts where the soloist can play virtuosic music of their choosing without the orchestra. “In my previous performances of the Beethoven concerto, I’ve performed cadenzas by Fritz Kreisler.

“This time I’ve chosen cadenzas by Vieuxtemps, a 19th-century virtuoso. Of all the cadenzas for the Beethoven concerto I’ve found, he’s the composer to have first performed the concerto closest to the time it was written – about 30 years after – so I feel this gives us a little window into a Beethoven-era cadenza.”

BOP Symphonia’s Beethoven’s Violin concert is at 3pm this Sunday, May 11, at Holy Trinity Church, Tauranga. Door tickets are $25 per adult, under-18s free. Eftpos available.