Harlequin was formed in 1990 and includes all the original personnel except for James, who has been with us since 1995. We made our debut at the Purcell Room in 1992 and have appeared there 16 times since. We have performed on BBC Radio 3 and 4, Classic FM, for the Council for Music in Hospitals, schools, universities and music societies. We were the only ensemble chosen unanimously by the judging panel for a Breakout! tour for Making Music, the National Federation of Music Societies. We have recorded the CD Diamonds. Harlequin functions both as a wind quintet and as a music theatre ensemble. Guest artists join us as occasion demands. These have included Nigel Clayton (piano), Philip Edwards (bass clarinet), Marcia Ferran (cor anglais), Roy Howat (piano), Susannah Self (soprano), Carol Wells (piano), Dacorum Singers and Dacorum Recorders. Harlequin commissions new works and performs seldom-heard pieces alongside established repertoire. The three upper winds between us double on a dozen instruments! We play both light and serious music but reject passionately the notion that all wind chamber music is necessarily of a light-hearted, frivolous nature. In the words of Samuel Pepys (1668), we aspire to be "that wind-musique which hath that real command over the soul." Harlequin's supporters include the Performing Right Society Foundation, the Musicians' Union, the Alan Bush, Frank Bridge, Kenneth Leighton and Alan Rawsthorne Trusts, the British Clarinet & Saxophone and Flute Societies, chartered accountants Charles Rippin & Turner and Emerson Edition.