Pavlova Winds Quintet

About Pavlova Winds Quintet

The Pavlova Winds Quintet, based in Oxford and Abingdon, give concerts throughout Oxfordshire. The group was formed in 1999 by Simon Payne, along with fellow-founder members Carolyn King and Chris Britton.

The Pavlova Wind Quintet has an impressively broad repertoire that includes music in several styles, from arrangements of light-hearted favourite tunes to the more substantial classics for wind quintet.

The aim of the group has been from the outset to explore the more unusual and exciting areas of the wind quintet repertoire. They delight in mixing the familiar and the unfamiliar, classical and ethnic, serene and virtuosic.

Over the years, the group has become one of the most enterprising and high-profile ensembles in Oxfordshire.

They have enjoyed many trips to towns twinned with Oxford and Abingdon – performing at garden parties, conferences and fundraising events. They have played in the Sheldonian Theatre for many years as part of Oxford’s ‘Open Doors’ weekend.

The group’s concert tours have also taken them to France and Germany on twin-town visits (Grenoble, Bonn, Argentan and Colmar) with concerts in unusual venues like an immigration detention centre near Oxford, a castle in Devon, and a German department store.

Many of their concerts are built around themes, with a South American one including the first UK performances of dance suites by the Brazilian composer and conductor Julio Medaglia.

The group takes its name from the road where Simon lives in Abingdon (Anna Pavlova Close), which served as the initial main venue for their rehearsals. It was the former site of the Pavlova Leather Works, whose owner was a big fan of the famous early 20th-century ballet dancer.

In 2018 they recorded a CD of quintet arrangements on sale at www.pavlovaquintet.co.uk. Typically unusual, their first CD is based entirely on arrangements of piano and orchestral pieces, recorded for the first time.

To hire the quintet for a concert or event, contact simon.payne@virgin.net or 07775 904626.