Here is a brief overview about our Orchestra’s Conductor and Leader, who are both very talented musicians.
ANDREW LOWEN (Conductor)
Andrew Lowen studied music at Birmingham University where his main interests were in singing and Baroque performance practice. He conducted the university chamber choir and later directed the London based chamber choir Polyphony. It is as a teacher and encourager of young talent that Andrew has found his primary vocation. In the 1980s his boys' choir performed in most of the major cathedrals of the British Isles. During the 1990s he worked at Kent College in Canterbury where he developed a music department which was presenting works such as Verdi's Requiem, Holst's The Planets and major Romantic symphonies. Andrew's career highlights include Verdi's Requiem in Canterbury Cathedral and in Cheltenham Town Hall; Saint-Saens' Organ Symphony in Canterbury Cathedral; and Haydn's Creation in Central Hall Westminster. Andrew is conductor of Maidstone Youth Orchestra and frequently appears on the podium with the South Kent Youth Orchestra. He conducts the adult musicians of the Folkestone and Hythe Orchestral Society and the Canterbury Orchestra and has been musical director of the Sittingbourne Orpheus Choral Society since January 2007. In addition to his busy conducting schedule he spends four days a week at Maidstone Grammar School where he is Director of Music.
FLORIANE PEYCELON (Leader)
Floriane began playing the violin at the age of six when she joined the junior branch of the Lyon National Conservatoire of Music and Drama. For the most part of her time there, she was taught by the then Leader of the Lyon National Orchestra and Head of Strings at the Conservatoire: Jean Bisciglia. After graduating at the Conservatoire in 1990, Flo studied politics at University whilst playing first violin in the Lyon Sinfonietta. Since settling in England, she is sharing her time between teaching and playing. Amongst other things, she teaches the bursary violin students at the University of Kent and plays in a number of ad hoc orchestras in the area. She has been leading our orchestra since January 2000 and in July 2004 gave an outstanding performance of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto with the orchestra.