NEXT year, January 27, 2006, will be the 250th anniversary of Mozart's birth.

In celebration Emma Johnson, one of the world's favourite instrumentalists, will be giving concerts across the UK of favourite Mozart works for clarinet.

The Clarinet Concerto and Clarinet Quintet will take place at Evesham Arts Centre on Friday, November, 11.

When Emma won the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition in 1984, the demand from the public for recordings of this charismatic new artist was so great that the major record retailers WH Smith commissioned record label ASV to make a recording of the Mozart Clarinet Concerto, the centrepiece of the solo clarinet repertoire.

Since that early success Emma Johnson and Mozart has remained a favourite combination with audiences across the UK.

Twenty years later, and after the huge success of a solo album Voyage, Emma has been back into the studio to record a new version on the concerto, which she directs from the clarinet with the RPO.

It has just been released on the Universal Classics label in the lead-up to the Mozart 250th anniversary celebrations in January 2006, the recording pairs the concerto with the Clarinet Quintet, another pillar of the clarinet repertoire, for which she is joined by the Contempo Quartet.

To complete the disc are Johnson's own arrangements of some of Mozart's most popular arias and sacred songs: Papageno's Song, Voi Che Sapete and Ave Verum Corpus.

Evehsam's performance will include the works of Mozart, Schumann, Rossini, Lutoslawski, Vaughan Williams, Morricone, Chopin, Goodman and a recital with John Lenehan on piano.

Emma will also bring her musical talent to the Forum Theatre. Malvern on March 25, 2006.