LOOKING back on a set of variations he wrote as a teenager, Charles Ives described them as half fun and half serious. Which is how conductor Nicholas Kok approaches the gala event he has directed in Nottingham for well over a decade.

Good music combined with a party mood – spurred on by an audience that he came to know and cherish as music director of sinfonia ViVA.

Although the baton recently passed to André de Ridder, Kok looks forward to returning to a part of the country "with an energy of its own, and often overlooked."

He candidly admits that when first engaged for a New Year's Eve concert, the former Oxford organ scholar made heavy weather of compering it. Friendly players and listeners have since helped him relax.

But why perform Ives's Variations on America in this year's concert, when London and Britishness are the themes? The answer is that the American hymn My Country, 'Tis of Thee fits the tune that we know as God Save the Queen.

Ives used it for a suite of organ movements spiced with extravagant harmonies, and the piece was later orchestrated by William Schuman.

More obvious is the choice of William Walton's splendid orchestral anthem Crown Imperial. Kok also enjoys Elgar's Pomp and Circumstance March No. 4, not for any jingoistic associations but because of the elegant scoring.

"It simply trips off the pen," he says.

The same goes for Eric Coates's Knightsbridge March, seldom heard today. And, following a successful earlier arrangement for ViVA, percussionist Graham Hall is now customising popular favourite A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square.

Vaughan Williams's The Lark Ascending, inspired by George Meredith's poem, will be a well-earned showcase for leader Benedict Holland.

And Haydn's inclusion in Vienna's traditional New Year's Day concert prompted Kok to programme the finale of his Symphony No. 104, the London.

Subsequent visitors to the English capital were Johann Strauss, father and son. After conducting a staggering number of performances (over 60), the younger Strauss composed a musical souvenir entitled Recollections of Covent Garden.

"The waltz features melodies sounding distinctly familiar to English ears," says Kok.

"Johann Strauss I, for his part, worked God Save the Queen into a Homage to Queen Victoria which also incorporates Rule, Britannia at the start.

"It will be a feast of music," he says.

Not to mention the festive surprises.