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Ten things you didn’t know about the Learig Orchestra:

1. The orchestra started out as a mainly string group playing in a front room of a house in a leafy suburb of Aberdeen in the late 80s.Just one of the original members still plays with the orchestra.

2. The orchestra played at the Portlethen Gala. It rained all day so we were glad to be in a marquee.

3. The orchestra has performed a Haydn symphony with the horn part played on a saxophone.

4. The word learig comes from Old English or Scots, and refers to the strip of unploughed land at the edge of a field; conversely, the land that had been ploughed was generally referred to as the runrig.

5. The orchestra rehearsed for several years in a fire station.

6. The orchestra once gave an outdoor concert in central Aberdeen, helping to promote the city. As it was a fine drying day, sheets of music (as well as at least one music stand) were scattered the length of Union Street.

7. The orchestra once gave a concert including a work by Lee Rigg – an Aberdonian bassoon virtuoso much admired by Beethoven and Schubert.

8. The orchestra has given nearly 50 concerts, raising more than £10,000 for a variety of charities. That is a total of well over six million separate notes, and a significant proportion of which were in tune and played in the right order!

9. The orchestra performed a concert in Inverurie Town Hall. The programme included a number of tenor arias sung by the proprietor of a local Italian restaurant.

10. Many other interesting facts can be gleaned from info@learig.org.uk.