A PROFESSIONAL musician who has played with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra has been using his time during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown to record a new album - with his mum.

Laurence Davies, 54, is more used to playing the French Horn on many Hollywood film scores recorded at the world-famous Abbey Road Studios in London, including the Marvel and Avenger series, Pixel and the latest James Bond movie No Time to Die which has yet to be released.

He was a member of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra for ten years and now works as a freelance studio musician.

Now he has been recording a new album of classical music with his 80-year-old mother Helen, who has spent her life working as a professional pianist after studying in Vienna.

Mr Davies said: “Looking for a silver lining these last few months I have been playing a lot with my mother throughout all the lockdowns.

“We both live in Calne. We didn’t start out with this in mind but have now rehearsed enough music for a CD and have recorded our second day’s worth of tracks at Wiltshire Music Centre.”

The pair have recorded six pieces at the centre on December 16 and on January 18, including music for the horn and piano by Ludwig van Beethoven, Robert Schumann, Franz Strauss and his son Richard Strauss, Paul Hindemith and Arnold Cooke, one of Hindemith’s pupils.

Mr Davies, of Shelburne Road, Calne, added: “We will be editing the tracks in February and hope to release the CD, Connections, in March or April.

“There’s about one hour’s worth of music on the CD. Music is an international language and we are very much in the tradition of the music of continental Europe.”

Mr Davies grew up in Marlborough where both his parents, Helen and Edward Davies, taught at the college from 1969 until 1981.

The family moved to Anglesey when Mr Davies senior moved to a new job at Bangor University.

Mr Davies said: "I have spent most of my life living in or around London so we never got much of a chance to play together professionally.

"They lived in Menai Bridge until November 2018 when they moved back to Wiltshire and came to live in Calne.

"I moved back to Wiltshire in 2012 with my wife Sian who is still in the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

"Mum trained in Vienna from a very young age - I think between the ages of 11 and 16 - and then at the Royal Manchester College of Music, now the Royal Northern College of Music, where she met dad who is a violinist."

He added: "One interesting fact is that in the film The Lady in the Van, mum plays the part of Maggie Smith's hands when she is playing the piano."

Recent films in which Mr Davies has played include Avengers End Game, Untrainable Dragon, Trolls World Tour, Dragon Rider, Fast and Furious Presents Hobbs and Shaw, Shaun the Sheep Farmageddon, Rocketman, Cats and the video game Jedi: Fallen Order.

He now runs a company called Oldbury Tours which organises bespoke tours of prehistoric sites in Wiltshire, including Avebury and and Stonehenge World Heritage Site.