As part of our commitment to the arts we sponsored a performance by the Festival Chamber Orchestra as part of this year’s Canterbury Festival.

The Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Stephen Barlow, played a spectacular medley of well-known and not so well-known pieces for the audience (all with socially distanced seating and face masks encouraged).

Speaking to us before the event, which took place in the Great Hall, at Kent College, Canterbury, Ian Crowther (pictured), the FCO founder and principle oboist said: “Stephen is a fantastic musician and knows exactly what he wants from us – and he gets it. All the orchestra love playing for him. We have performed so many events together and it has been fantastic. The musicians really respect his musical expertise and the reward is a marvellous concert for the audience.”

A chance to meet (safely) with our ENT consultant colleagues

We hosted a special reception before the event to bring together our specialist clinical team with the ENT consultants we support at our private hospital locations. We also held a company-wide competition so that members of staff, who have been working so hard during the COVID pandemic, could win tickets to join us and share the experience.

Speaking at the reception, our clinical manager, Marta Lopes, said: “It was great to see our colleagues and enjoy the music with our ENT consultants. A very welcome opportunity to see each other face-to-face without hospital scrubs!”

Joining from Hearbase, and pictured from left were, Fiona Idriss, senior audiologist and tinnitus specialist, Marta Lopes, clinical manager, Joana Carvalho, senior audiologist and hearing protection specialist, Clara Mesquita, audiologist for South Kent NHS services, and (not pictured, sadly, maybe because she was topping up her glass!) Beth Woodhouse, audiologist for South Kent NHS services.

Thank you to everyone who attended. We hope you had a good evening, and thank you to all the ENT consultants for joining us, and of course, to the musicians of the FCO for putting on such a superb show.