The Bach Choir commissions ten composers this season, including Richard Blackford & Gabriel Jackson at the Royal Festival Hall
As they return to live music-making after a year and a half of silence, The Bach Choir and Music Director David Hill announce the premieres of ten newly-commissioned contemporary choral works. Three of the works to be performed this season use texts written by members of the Choir, including the Royal Festival Hall premiere of Richard Blackford’s covid-inspired cantata setting the medical diaries of a Choir member who spent three months in intensive care, and a climate-change inspired commission from Gabriel Jackson. This July, the Choir announces a call for scores for the Sir David Willcocks Carol Competition to premiere two new carols at Cadogan Hall, and heads to the studio to record six newly-commissioned chorales from award-winning young composers in its Bach Inspired project.
Read moreInsula orchestra and Laurence Equilbey champion Louise Farrenc on disc
In a new recording to be released on Warners Erato on 9 July 2021, Laurence Equilbey and her period-instrument Insula orchestra champion the Symphonies of Louise Farrenc, a prominent and pioneering figure in 19th century Paris. Recorded live in concert in March 2021, this album presents two of Farrenc’s three symphonies, No. 1 in C minor, first heard in 1845, and No. 3 in G minor, premiered in 1849. Farrenc’s rich harmonic writing, vivid colours and lyricism shine through in the performance by Insula orchestra, which specialises in performing Classical and Romantic repertoire on period instruments.
Read moreThe Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra announces Oxford Piano Festival 2021
The Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra and Artistic Director Marios Papadopoulos announce the 23rd Oxford Piano Festival taking place from 25 July – 1 August 2021. The Festival welcomes some of the world’s most distinguished pianists and teachers for the week-long series of varied concerts and masterclasses. This year, concerts and masterclasses are given by Stephen Kovacevich, Stephen Hough, Peter Donohoe, Kathryn Stott, Mishka Rushdie Momen and Barry Douglas, while the faculty also includes Ian Jones, Helen Krizos, Peter Bithell and Vanessa Latarche. For the first time, three evening recitals and a number of masterclasses will be live- streamed to audiences worldwide, streaming free via the Orchestra’s YouTube Channel and available for 24 hours on demand. All concerts and masterclasses will once more welcome live audiences in accordance with coronavirus restrictions.
Read moreLondon Mozart Players and Roxanna Panufnik launch music video to raise money for Myanmar refugees
London Mozart Players and oboist Olivier Stankiewicz join forces with renowned composer Roxanna Panufnik to highlight the crisis in Myanmar and raise money for Myanmar refugees who are fleeing attacks by the military. The ensemble releases a brand-new video of Panufnik’s Letters from Burma, her 2004 composition inspired by Nobel Peace Prize-winner Aung San Suu Kyi’s remarkable collection of the same name describing everyday life in the country, and written during her time under house arrest.
Read moreGötterdämmerung seals the fate of Stephen Langridge’s ecologically-sustainable Ring cycle in Göteborg Opera’s 2021/22 season
The Göteborg Opera announces its 2021/22 season with a return to live performances including the grand finale of its four-year Ring cycle in the sublime apocalypse of Götterdämmerung marking the 400th anniversary of the city of Gothenburg. Göteborg Opera goes local in Gösta Nystroem’s 1959 opera Herr Arnes penningar, set in the area’s medieval hinterlands, and a suffragette cantata by Gothenburg organist Elfrida Andrée, while looking abroad to Italy with productions of Puccini’s Tosca, Verdi’s Rigoletto, Rossini’s Barbiere di Siviglia, and Donizetti’s witty behind-the-scenes account of a chaotic opera rehearsal, Viva la mamma. The new season is the first to been conceived by Henning Ruhe, appointed Artistic Director Opera/Drama at the Göteborg Opera in June 2019.
Read moreOxford Philharmonic Orchestra returns to live performance with Steven Isserlis, Chevalier de Saint Georges and a UN World Environment Day concert
Making their long-awaited return to live performance for the first time since March 2020, the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director Marios Papadopoulos will once again welcome live audiences to the historic Sheldonian Theatre. Performing four concerts throughout June, the Orchestra launches the series on UN World Environment Day with further concerts featuring Haydn’s Cello Concerto No. 1 with Steven Isserlis and two concerts exploring the works of Chevalier de Saint-Georges and his contemporary, Mozart. In a celebration of UN World Environment Day on Saturday 5 June 2021, the Orchestra presents a special programme centred around the Amazonian Moonflower.
Read moreChristophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques release world premiere recording of Lully’s Ballet Royal de la Naissance de Vénus
In the first full recording of the 1665 courtly entertainment, Christophe Rousset directs Les Talens Lyriques in Jean-Baptiste Lully’s Ballet Royal de la Naissance de Vénus, a grandiose spectacle of dance, music and poetry which marked a culmination of the ballet genre when it was performed at the court of Louis XIV. Released on Aparté on 18 June 2021, the Ballet Royal de la Naissance de Vénus is the ninth Lully recording released by Les Talens Lyriques, continuing their highly-renowned survey of the composer’s stage works. The recording was made in January 2021 at the Cité de la Musique-Philharmonie de Paris, following cancelled performances in Paris and Vienna due to the pandemic. A distinguished cast includes Deborah Cachet as Ariana, Cyril Auvity as Orpheus, with Guillaume Andrieux and Bénédicte Tauran as Neptune and Thétis.
Read moreTamsin Waley-Cohen announces this year’s Two Moors Festival, Arcadia Unlocked, with composer-in-residence Huw Watkins
In an all-embracing celebration of wilderness in the South West, following a year of rediscovering the world outside our doors, Artistic Director and violinist Tamsin Waley-Cohen announces the 2021 Two Moors Festival and its theme, Arcadia Unlocked. The internationally-renowned Festival takes place over two weekends in October: Dartmoor is the focus for 1-3 October 2021, while concerts taking place from 8-10 October 2021 centre around Exmoor, with concerts held in close proximity to each other in beautiful venues from rural arts centres to churches around the vast and arresting wilderness of the moors.
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