THIS weekend sees the start of the 2008-9 season of concerts for no fewer than three of our local music societies, writes Dave Robson.

Darlington Piano Society is first off the mark with a free public masterclass tomorrow morning for three talented young local piano students, taken by Margaret Fingerhut, whose recital follows in the evening. It starts at 10.30am at Darlington Arts Centre and is free.

The programme for the recital is wide-ranging, including Beethoven’s Pastoral Sonata, Liszt’s Vallee d’Obermann and Debussy’s L’Isle Joyeuse, set against pieces by John Ireland, MacDowell and Potts’ haunting Farewell to Hirta.

Robert Scamardella makes a return visit on November 1, to play Schumann, Brahms and Ravel, and, from China, Wu Qian, will perform Chopin, Granados and Schumann on December 6. All concerts are at 7.30 in the Arts Centre (01325-486555). For season tickets for all seven concerts, ring 01642-617200. The website is www.communigate.co.uk/ne/dar lingtonpiano/index.phtml.

For performances on a slightly larger scale, look to Richmondshire Subscription Concerts which begins the season tomorrow evening with Zephyr, a wind quintet plus piano, playing the Mozart K 452 Quintet and Beethoven Op 14 Quintet and the rarer Sextet by Thuille, contrasting with the more open textures of Poulenc’s Trio for oboe, bassoon and piano. The concert is at 7.30pm at the Georgian Theatre Royal.

The season continues with Oboe Quartet, led by local-born (now Netherlands-based) oboist Viki Laws, which offers opportunity to hear music by Mozart, Britten, Martinu, Paul Patterson and Dohnanyi’s marvellous Oboe Quartet. This takes place at St Mary’s Church, Richmond, at 7.30.

For full details of the seven-event season and tickets, tel 01748- 821343.

On Monday, October 6, Ripon Cathedral Concerts Society opens with the Kesh Piano Duo and a programme of Schubert’s Marche Militaire, Lebensturme and Fantasie plus Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite and Stravinsky’s Petruska Suite. It will be interesting to hear how they cope with the cathedral’s rather lively acoustic.

On November 10, the well-established Henschell String Quartet plays two Mendelssohn quartets, one by Haydn and Shostakovich’s 7th Quartet. December 1 sees violinist Ruth Palmer and pianist Maxayama Tayama give a programme of Bach’s Chaconne, Janacek’s Sonata, Brahms and Ravel; all 7.30, in the cathedral.

Full details of this six-concert season are available from www.riponconcerts.

co.uk or 01765-605771.

Darlington Music Society opens its account on Saturday, October 11, with the young Solstice String Quartet, which was founded at Cambridge University in 2003.

The programme lists classical quartets by Haydn, the Op 76/6, Mendelssohn’s Op. 13 and Beethoven’s Op 59/2.

This is followed, on November 15, by a cello and piano recital by Pei- Jee Ng, from Australia, and Ben Powell, playing Beethoven’s 12 Variations on a theme (See the conquering hero comes) by Handel, Shostakovich’s splendid Cello Sonata in D minor and Rachmaninov’s Op 19 Sonata.

Russian-born Sophia Lisovskaya gives the season’s piano recital on December 13 with Beethoven’s Pathétique Sonata preceding a selection of shorter pieces by Chopin and Scriabin.

For details and tickets, ring the Arts Centre box office on 01325- 486555.

Last off the mark, but by no means least, Teesside Music Society brings one of Britain’s finest exponents of early music to the North-East, though with a slightly different repertoire, on October 26 in Stokesley Methodist Church, at 7.45pm.

Dame Emma Kirkby, a renowned soprano and for many years been a treasure of the baroque repertoire, will move forward in time to Haydn’s Six English Songs, Mozart and the US composer Amy Beach.

Between the songs, her pianist, James Lisney, will show off his talent as a soloist in Beethoven’s Op 109 and Schubert’s D 157 Piano Sonatas – should be fascinating.

On November 9, Vicky Law’s Oboe Quartet repeats its programme from the night before in Richmond (see above) at St Bernadette’s Church, Nunthorpe, 7.45pm.

The Wihan String Quartet, from the Czech Republic, comes to St Bernadette’s on December 14 with Mozart’s K387 ‘Spring’ Quartet, Schubert’s Rosamunde and Dvorak’s popular Op 105 Quartet.

Log on to www.teesmusic.co.uk for more details; this site should also give links to Darlington piano and music societies’ websites.

For anyone wishing to travel a little further, visit websites for Musicon, the Durham University series, is on the Durham University website www.dur.ac.uk/concerts; Hartlepool Music Society’s programme can be seen on hartlepoolmusicsociety.ork.uk.