Festival events
Weekend 1
Saturday 7 May, 7.30pm Ligeti Quartet
Sunday 8 May, 3.30pm Stockhausen: Am Himmel wandre ich
Sunday 8 May, 7.30pm Two new operas
Weekend 2
Saturday 14 May, 3.30pm Music for violin and piano
Saturday 14 May, 7.30pm Wetlands: Stephen Gutman, piano
Sunday 15 May, 3.30pm Celebrating Judith Weir
Sunday 15 May, 7.30pm Kate Ryder - A Piano Diary
Saturday 7 May 2022, 7.30pm
Ligeti Quartet
For the opening concert, the acclaimed Ligeti Quartet
present an exciting programme of recent works
for string quartet.
Cassandra Miller
Ayanna Witter-Johnson
Carola Bauckholt
Arthur Keegan-Bole
John Luther Adams
Christian Mason
'Swainson's Thrush' from Warblework (2011)
Earth (2018)
Lichtung (2012)
Afterwards - Elegies for Tom (2022)
Wind in High Places (2011)
Sardinian Songbook (2018)
Tickets: £12 (£8 concessions)
Sunday 8 May 2022, 3.30pm
Karlheinz Stockhausen: Am Himmel wandre ich
Rebecca Hardwick (soprano)
George Chambers (tenor)
"... make it beautiful, get out your rainbow colours..."
"I am like the quetzal bird"
Two singers perform twelve songs based on indigenous American texts, reflecting on nature, mysticism, life and the universe. Growing out of a single note and taking in a range of vocal sounds and theatrical gestures, this rare performance of Stockhausen's 1972 classic is not to be missed.
Tickets: £10 (£5 concessions)
Sunday 8 May 2022, 7.30pm
Opera now: two new works for solo voice
Gina Fergione
and Lynda Morgan
Susannah Self
Emily Hobhouse:"that bloody woman" (first performance)
Analysis, an installation opera
Two new works by composer/performers take the operatic genre to new places with just a solo voice, instruments and soundscape.
In Analysis, Susannah Self explores turning points in her own life, through the prism of a ten-year period of Jungian analysis. The result is by turns dark, witty, true and revealing.
Gina Fergione and Lynda Morgan's Emily Hobhouse, "that bloody woman", is based on the life of campaigner and activist Emily Hobhouse who defied the government at the time to raise awareness of conditions in British concentration camps during the Boehr War.
Tickets: £12 (£8 concessions)
Saturday 14 May 2022, 3.30pm
Music for violin and piano
Jane Faulkner (violin)
Gary Peacock (piano)
Perpetual Pavan
Kiss on Wood
Spiegel im Spiegel
Voyager (first performance)
Suite Hébraïque No. 6
David Braid
James MacMillan
Arvo Pärt
Gary Peacock
Srul Irving Glick
The second festival weekend kicks off with a programme featuring two absolute classics of the contemporary violin repertoire by James MacMillan and Arvo Pärt, alongside the haunting sixth Suite Hébraïque by Canadian composer Srul Irving Glick.
Tickets: £10 (£5 concessions)
Saturday 14 May 2022, 7.30pm
Wetlands
Stephen Gutman (piano)
Stephen Gutman's exquisitely crafted programme brings together a variety of works for solo piano reflecting on nature and birdsong in particular, by composers of the 20th and 21st century.
Olivier Messiaen
Per Nørgård
Olivier Messiaen
Katharine Norman
Olivier Messiaen
Clive Pollard
Katharine Norman
Nick Huggins
Peter Wiegold
Olivier Messiaen
Simon Holt
Olivier Messiaen
Julian Anderson
Olivier Messiaen
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 1 (Robin)
Light of a Night (Paul meets Bird)
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 2 (Blackbird)
Cold light, 6am; Still, Clear
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 3 (Robin)
The Dragonfly
High Force
A few yards out to sea...
Honfleur
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 4 (Songthrush)
'a long cast shadow'
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 5 (Robin)
Etude - '"By and by, out of the white horizon, the long, low sea"
Petites Esquisses d’Oiseaux 6 (Lark)
Tickets: £12 (£8 concessions)
Sunday 15 May 2022, 3.30pm
Celebrating Judith Weir and friends
Sarah Leonard (soprano)
Stephen Gutman (piano)
Jonathan Dove
Judith Weir
Judith Weir
Joe Cutler
Judith Weir
Jonathan Dove
My Love is Mine
A Spanish Liederbooklet
The Art of Touching the Keyboard
In Praise of Dreams
King Harald’s Saga
Five Am’rous Sighs
We celebrate the vibrant and inventive music of Judith Weir in this Sunday afternoon concert. A pianistic tour-de-force and a set of three colourful Spanish songs are followed by the virtuoso, King Harald's Saga, in which Sarah Leonard takes on all eight roles in this 'grand opera in three acts for solo soprano'. Cycles of songs by Joe Cutler and Jonathan Dove complete the programme.
Tickets: £10 (£5 concessions)
Sunday 15 May 2022, 7.30pm
A Piano Diary
Kate Ryder (piano, amplified piano and toy pianos)
John Cage
George Crumb
Dai Fujikura
Brian Inglis
Meredith Monk
Stephen Montague
Judith Weir
Julia Wolfe
Suite for Toy Piano
A Little Midnight Music, for amplified piano
Akiko’s Diary, for piano
Four Pieces for Toy Piano
Railroad (Travel Song), for piano
Mirabella, for toy piano
Fragile (A Love Song), for piano
East Broadway, for toy piano and toy beatbox
Kate Ryder wraps up the festival with an intimate and exciting programme of music for piano and toy pianos, with particular resonance for these uncertain times. From the poignant Akiko's Diary and the delicate joy of Fragile, to the restless energy of Railroad, the humour of Mirabella and East Broadway for toy pianos, and the ghostly echoes and tolling bells in A Little Midnight Music, George Crumb’s homage to iconic Jazz pianist Thelonius Monk, themes of memory, belonging, reflection and renewal gradually unfold throughout this personal diary.
Tickets: £12 (£8 concessions)