A CELEBRATION of the great French composers' well quite a few of them anyway, in a balanced three-part concert.

The settings of Verlaine's poetry by both Fauré (Cinq melodies de Venise) and Debussy (Ariettes Oubliees) were distinc- tively marked. Poulenc's Trois Poems do Louise Vilmorin touched heartstrings in The Officers of the White guard.

Faure's Piano Quartet No.1 with Rita Manning, violin, Philip Dukes, viola, Justin Pearson, cello and Stephen Gutman, piano given in buoyant mood, its melodic material cheerfully despatched.

Conductor Tom Hammond directed the Trinity College of Music Soloist Ensemble in Milhaud's ballet suite La Creation du Monde.

Emma Price delighted with Debussy's exotic Syrinx for solo flute. In all an enterprising slant on French music less frequently heard in the concert hall.