Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate.

Hay Primary School

Tickets: Free but please see below for how to obtain.

The first of two concerts this weekend in celebration of Hay Music's One Hundredth Concert: 

THE CoMA LONDON ENSEMBLE

CoMA (Contemporary Music for All -  www.coma.org) was created in 1993 as a vehicle for enthusiastic amateur musicians to perform new music. CoMA London Ensemble is one of a number of groups under the umbrella of CoMA, and performs several concerts per season, with repertoire by living composers, mostly written in flexibly scored ‘Open Score’ format specially for CoMA ensembles.  CoMA London Ensemble has performed at many UK festivals and in concerts in Maastricht, Paris and Berlin.

The programme for this concert comprises a varied group of pieces chosen to illustrate the wide range of styles that have emerged over the years.  All the pieces will be Welsh Premieres!

Some pieces will also feature pupils from Hay Primary School who will have been trained in workshops leading up to the concert, so that they can play with the ensemble.

Conductor:  Gregory Rose

Associate conductor, working with the children of Hay School:  Andrew Morris

Programme to include:

Kirsty Devaney:  Hadal Zone

Gregory Rose:  Red Planet

Philip Cashian:  Mechanik

Piers Hellawell:   Maquette

Simon Speare:  A Gentle Weeping

Peter McGarr:  Imaginary Orchestras 

Dominic Murcott:  MT Modulation

Gregory Rose - conductor/composer

Music director of CoMA London Ensemble since 1999, this will be his last concert as conductor.  Gregory is conductor of Jupiter Orchestra, Jupiter Singers, Singcircle and Trinity Laban Contemporary Music Group, and appears as an orchestral and choral guest conductor throughout Europe and East Asia, including St Petersburg Symphony (Russia), Finnish Radio Symphony, Polish National Radio Symphony and London Philharmonic Orchestras, and National Symphony Orchestras of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Ireland, Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, Latvian Radio Choir, etc.  He has conducted thousands of premieres and has worked closely with many leading composers, including Cage, Stockhausen, Reich, Lachenmann, Wolff and Birtwistle. His large catalogue of compositions includes Birthday Ode for Aaron Copland, Tapiola Sunrise, Thambapani and Violin Concerto.  His Missa Sancta Pauli Apostoli won one of the British Composer Awards 2006.  His large-scale music-theatre work, Danse macabre was premiered with much success in Tallinn, Estonia in 2011, and the subsequent recording has received many accolades. Gregory collaborated in the premiere recording of John Cage’s iconic Song Books which sold out its first pressing. He has appeared in festivals throughout Europe and has made many recordings, including working as conductor/arranger for Linda Ronstadt, Madness and Diana Ross. He has conducted many operas and is a staff conductor at Trinity Laban.   

Refreshments available during the interval

The concert is free with a retiring collection.  Entry is by ticket which can be obtained by emailing your requirement to music@haymusic.org or from Reception at Hay Primary School Monday - Friday, 8.30am - 3.30pm from 29 April and not during Whitsun break - 27 - 31 May.

St Mary’s Church, Hay-on-Wye

Tickets £15 (students £7.50)

Tickets in person from Richard Booth's Bookshop, 44 Lion Street, Hay-on-Wye

or online through Booth's Bookshop

or at the door if available

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate

Hay Music proudly welcomes

Rachel Podger and Kristian Bezuidenhout

in a celebration of One Hundred Hay Music Concerts!

Programme

J.S. Bach:  Sonata for violin and harpsichord in G major, BWV 1019

Handel:  Sonata in D major HWV 371

J.S. Bach:  Sonata No 2 for Violin and Obligato Harpsichord in A major BWV 1015

C.P.E. Bach:  Sonata in B minor Wq 76

C.P.E. Bach:  Fantasie in f sharp minor Wq 67

J.S. Bach:  Chorale prelude 'Christ lag in Todesbanden' BWV 625

“There is probably no more inspirational musician working today …” (Gramophone) Rachel Podger, “the queen of the baroque violin” (Sunday Times) has established herself as a leading interpreter of the Baroque and Classical music periods. She was the first woman to be awarded the prestigious Royal Academy of Music/Kohn Foundation Bach Prize in October 2015.  She is the founder and Artistic Director of Brecon Baroque Festival and her ensemble Brecon Baroque.

As a director and soloist, Rachel has enjoyed countless collaborations with musicians all over the world. Highlights include Robert Levin, Jordi Savall, Masaaki Suzuki, European Union Baroque Orchestra, English Concert, The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, The Academy of Ancient Music, Holland Baroque Society, Tafelmusik (Toronto), and, in the USA, the Berwick Academy, the Handel and Haydn Society, Berkeley Early Music, Oregon Bach Festival, and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra. 

She has recently collaborated with harpsichordist Kristian Bezuidenhout with performances in Padova, Katowice, Antwerp, Amsterdam, Den Haag, Kiel, Seville, Oxford, and Boston USA. In 2018 Rachel led Brecon Baroque in their debut at the Edinburgh Festival and performed solo recitals and broadcasts for BBC Radio 3 and collaborated with acclaimed vocal group I Fagiolini to open the BBC Proms Chamber Music Series.

Rachel has won numerous awards including two Baroque Instrumental Gramophone Awards for La Stravaganza and Biber Rosary Sonatas, the Diapason d’Or de l’année in the Baroque Ensemble category for La Cetra Vivaldi concertos, a BBC Music Magazine Award in the instrumental category for Guardian Angel, and multiple Diapasons d’Or. The complete Vivaldi L’Estro Armonico concertos with Brecon Baroque was Record of the Month for both BBC Music and Gramophone Magazines, won the concerto category of the 2016 BBC Music Magazine Award, was awarded a Diapason d’Or and was shortlisted for a Gramophone Award .

Rachel is a dedicated educator and holds the Micaela Comberti Chair for Baroque Violin at The Royal College of Music, and the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama where she holds the Jane Hodge Foundation International Chair in Baroque Violin. She also has a developing relationship with The Juilliard School in New York.

Kristian Bezuidenhout is one of today’s most notable and exciting keyboard artists, equally at home on the fortepiano, harpsichord, and modern piano. Born in South Africa, he began his studies in Australia, completed them at the Eastman School of Music and now lives in London. Kristian first gained international recognition at the age of 21 after winning the prestigious first prize in the Bruges Fortepiano Competition. 

Kristian is a regular guest with the world’s leading ensembles including the Freiburger Barockorchester, Les Arts Florissants, Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Orchestre des Champs Elysées, Koninklijk Concertgebouworkest, Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester. He has guest-directed (from the keyboard) the English Concert, Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century, Tafelmusik, Collegium Vocale, Juilliard 415 and the Kammerakademie Potsdam and Dunedin Consort. He has performed with artists including John Eliot Gardiner, Philippe Herreweghe, Frans Brüggen, Trevor Pinnock, Giovanni Antonini, Jean-Guihen Queyras, Isabelle Faust, Alina Ibragimova, Rachel Podger, Carolyn Sampson, Anne Sofie von Otter, Mark Padmore and Matthias Goerne.

Kristian's discography includes the complete keyboard music of Mozart, Mozart Violin Sonatas with Petra Müllejans, Mendelssohn and Mozart Piano Concertos with the Freiburger Barockorchester, Beethoven and Mozart Lieder and Schumann Dichterliebe with Mark Padmore.

Kristian has recently becomes Artistic Director of the Freiburger Barockorchester and Principal Guest Conductor with the English Concert. He play-directs with both orchestras and also with Camerata Salzburg, Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and Zürcher Kammerorchester. As a soloist he performs with Orchestre des Champs Elysees/Herreweghe, Les Violons du Roy/Cohen and Le Concert Olympique/Caeyers.  Solo recitals and chamber music take him to London, Rome, Amsterdam, Stuttgart, Munich, Cologne, Berlin, USA and Japan. 

Refreshments available during the interval

Dorstone House, Dorstone

There are no tickets and admission is free, but guests are asked to email or telephone their request for seats so that we can keep track of numbers: michaelhession51@gmail.com or 01981 550300 

Please note:  time given for end of the event is approximate.

In July 2019 Hay Music celebrates its 100th concert and in a homage to the renowned Radio 3 programme presented by composer Michael Berkeley, in which music lovers are asked about the part music has played in their personal lives, Hay Music presents its own

‘PRIVATE PASSIONS’

Musician and broadcaster Nick Gethin interviews JOHN STARK, founder of Hay Music, under whose inspiration and leadership Hay Music has grown and flourished since 2011.

The event will take place in the Music Room at Dorstone House where there is a good quality hi-fi system through which the music extracts will be played.

Car parking will be as usual for Dorstone concerts. Guests are welcome to bring a picnic tea and enjoy the garden from 3.30 pm and after the event complimentary glasses of wine (or other drinks) will be available with the opportunity to make a donation to Hay Music.

Dorstone House, Dorstone

Tickets £15 (students £7.50)

Tickets in person from Richard Booth's Bookshop, 44 Lion Street, Hay-on-Wye

or online through Booth's Bookshop

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate.

This concert is presented in collaboration with the Keyboard Trust – www.keyboardtrust.org

Programme

Franz Schubert:  Four Impromptus Op. 90

The deservedly popular set of impromptus were written in 1827, one year before Schubert’s premature death at the age of 31. The publisher of the first two used the term ‘Impromptu’ and although the description was subsequently approved by Schubert they are no mere improvisations but full of the delightful and beautifully crafted melodic inventions of this master of song. The last two were not published until 1857, thirty years after their composition and the composer’s death. They have all been used in many films and are instantly recognisable, often attempted by amateurs, but in reality technically challenging.

Sergei Prokofiev:  Piano Sonata No. 3 Op.28

Sonata No. 3 has become one of Prokofiev’s most popular keyboard works. It was written in 1917 based on earlier themes that he had recorded in his teenage notebooks. It is a relatively short single movement work but with huge variations in tempi and dynamics. The composer gave the premiere in St. Petersburg the following year, and unlike many of his previous compositions it was critically acclaimed. Because of the upheaval caused by the 1917 revolution he sought, and obtained, permission to leave Russia for the United States, and did not return until 15 years later.

Modest Mussorgsky:  Suite ‘Pictures at an Exhibition’

‘Pictures’ is Mussorgsky’s most famous piano composition and a showpiece for virtuoso pianists. His long-time friend architect and artist Viktor Hartmann had died at the age of 39 and his friends curated an exhibition of 400 of his paintings, some of which were owned by Mussorgsky. The suite opens with a promenade theme, a visitor strolling through the gallery. Then follows the musical depiction of ten of the paintings culminating with the thrilling and majestic’ Great Gate of Kiev’. Huge chords depict the splendour and cumulative power of the artist’s ambitions for the city, and it forms a lasting memorial to the artistic and musical vision of two inspirational Russians.

A critically acclaimed pianist with varied repertoire, Ilya Kondratiev is the prize-winner of several renowned international music competitions, including Frederyk Chopin Hannover 2011, Franz Liszt Budapest 2011, Franz Liszt Weimar 2011, the Fifth Tbilisi 2013 and Brant Birmingham 2015. Born in Russia, he studied from the age of seven at the Samara College of Music with Victoria Soifer and, from the age of 16, at the Moscow State Tchaikovsky Conservatory with the distinguished teacher and People’s Artist of Russia Zinaida Ignatieva. In 2014 he moved to London in order to further his studies at the Royal College of Music under Vanessa Latarche and Sofia Gulyak, graduating with a Master of Performance and an Artist Diploma in Performance. He also won the Beethoven Senior Intercollegiate Competition in 2015 and the prestigious Chappell Gold Medal in 2016.

Ilya performs extensively as a soloist and chamber music player at venues such as the Great Hall of Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory, Gasteig Munich, Weimarhalle, Palacio de Festivales de Santander, the Palace of Arts in Budapest and the Great Hall of the Tbilisi Conservatoire. In 2009 he founded a chamber music ensemble Robert Quintet and won top prizes at the Sixth Stasys Vainunas Chamber Music Competition in 2009 and The Premio Vittorio Gui in Florence in 2011.

In 2011 Ilya was invited to work with Elisabeth Leonskaya at the Franz Liszt Piano Academy in Schilllingfurst, Germany and with Pavel Gililov at the Eppan Piano Academy in Italy. He has also performed in the masterclasses of Rolf-Dieter Arens, Dina Yoffe, Konstantin Shcherbakov, Willem Brons, Paul Gulda, Dmitry Bashkirov, Jerome Rose, Leslie Howard, Lang Lang and Arie Vardi.

In 2015 and 2017 Ilya was invited to the ‘Encuentro’ Festival in Santander and in 2016 appeared as a guest artist in the Gumusluk Festival in Turkey, and the Beethoven Music Festival and Academy in Altaussee in Austria. He is generously supported by the Keyboard Charitable Trust and Talent Unlimited Foundation.

Together with the performing, Ilya is developing his teaching career and in 2019 he joined the Royal College of Music London as a deputy piano professor.

A recent appearance for the Keyboard Charitable Trust in Cyprus received an ecstatic review from Yvonne Georgiadou, Artistic Director of The Pharos Cultural Centre:

”A revelation!....... Ilya is the most exceptional of all………Never before did a pianist keep me locked on my seat, full of excitement from beginning to end. He is a fascinating artist. He makes the piano sound like a full orchestra“.

St Mary’s Church, Hay-on-Wye

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate.

Max Baillie – violin     Ruth Gibson – viola  

Robin Michael – cello     William Conway – cello

Centred round the great Op. 9 String Trio of Beethoven, this quartet of amazing players will also perform three lesser known but wonderful string works from Russia. 

Programme

Beethoven (1770 – 1827):  String Trio Op. 9 No.1

Alfred Schnittke (1934 – 1998):  String Trio (1985)

Reinhold Gliere (1875 – 1956):  Duos for 2 cellos, Op 53

Anton Arensky (1861 – 1906):  Quartet Op. 35 in A minor - version for violin, viola and two cellos.

Maverick violinist and violist Max Baillie performs across a diverse spectrum of music embracing new commissions, improvisation, and collaborations with artists from all over the world. Based in London, England, he has performed as soloist, chamber musician, and orchestral leader on stages from the Royal Albert Hall to Glastonbury and from Mali to Moscow. Artists he has worked with come from many backgrounds and include Bobby McFerrin, John Williams, Bjork, Stevie Wonder and Anoushka Shankar.

Max is a member of ZRI, Zum Roten Igel. Named after the Red Hedgehog Tavern in Vienna, the ensemble has toured to major festivals with its re-scored versions of the Brahms clarinet quintet and the Schubert C major quintet, including accordion and santouri (dulcimer). The group has recently added a new program Adventures with Charlie Chaplin to its repertoire, a live score to an early Chaplin classic.

Since April 2017 Max has been regularly leading and directing Swiss-based chamber orchestra CHAARTS, with whom he made a disc for Sony and toured with Turkish pianist Fazil Say. He looks forward to projects next year including the Boswil Summer Festival and a tour with cellist Mischa Maisky.

Max is a graduate of the Yehudi Menuhin School, Berlin’s UdK, and has a degree in Political Philosophy from Christ's College, Cambridge.

Irish Violist Ruth Gibson manages a busy career of solo and chamber work. She began her musical studies at the age of 5, studying the violin with Maria Kelemen. At 12 she started learning the viola and it soon became her principal instrument, studying with Prof. Ronald Masin. Ruth has won many solo and chamber cups in the Irish Feis Ceoil including the repertoire, concerto, viola solo and chamber competitions. In December 2003 and 2004 she performed Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante with the Young European Strings Chamber Orchestra in Dublin's National Concert Hall. In the summer of 2004, Ruth was runner-up at the European String Teachers Association Young Musician of the Year in Rotterdam.

In 2009, Ruth graduated with First-class honours from the Royal Northern College of Music and in 2011 completed her Masters in Performance with Lawrence Power at the Royal College of Music.  In 2011 she was soloist with the Bournemouth Symphony where she played Holst’s elegiac Lyric Movement for Viola and Orchestra under Sir John Elliot Gardiner. Ruth performs with the Mercury Piano Quartet, the Barbirolli and Benyounes String Quartets, and has collaborated with numerous notable soloists including Erika Raum, Philip Graffin, Andrés Díaz, Barry Douglas and Amy Norrington.

Ruth plays regularly with Camerata Ireland, and led the viola section whilst the orchestra was on tour in South America, Russia, Finland and France.

Robin Michael studied at the Royal Academy of Music with David Strange and Colin Carr and later with Ferenc Rados. He is principal cellist in Orchestre Revolutionnaire et Romantique, Solo cellist with Orchestre Les Siecles (Paris) as well as regular guest principal cellist with the Australian Chamber Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, BBC National Orchestra of Wales, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Irish Chamber Orchestra, Britten Sinfonia, RTE Concert Orchestra, English Baroque Soloists, English National Opera and Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

Robin was the cellist in the Fidelio trio for over 10 years with whom he toured Europe, North America, Asia and South Africa. He has also appeared in collaboration with the Dante and Eroica quartets. Recent concert highlights include complete Bach and Britten suite cycles in France and London, the South Korean premier of Jonathan Harvey's 'Advaya' for cello and electronics, both Haydn concertos at the Spier festival in South Africa as well as festival appearances in Buenos Aires, Library of Congress, Washington, and European festivals including Cheltenham, Aldeburgh and St. Magnus. 

Forthcoming projects include a recording of the Brahms sonatas with Daniel Tong for Resonus Classics to be released in spring 2017, a Bach suite cycle at the St. Magnus festival, Britten Suite cycle at festival 'Phil Grobi' in the Auvergne and the first Kinnordy Chamber music festival in Scotland where he is co-artistic director with Daniel Tong.Robin plays on a cello made for him by the German luthier Stephan von Behr, 2010.

William Conway is an internationally renowned conductor and cellist, whose performances have been described as ‘astonishingly convincing’ (Opera magazine), ‘a tour de force’ (Guardian), with ‘a flair for the unpredictable’ (Financial Times). On the podium, he is known for his conviction, clarity and intelligent musicianship, while his collaborations with Hebrides Ensemble, of whom he is the Artistic Director and founding member, have been praised for their fresh and inspirational approach to programming.

Born in Glasgow, Conway studied at the Royal Scottish Academy of Music then London’s Royal College of Music before returning to Scotland to take the position of Principal Cello with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, a post he held for ten years. He is a founding member and Co-principal Cello of the Chamber Orchestra of Europe and has worked with many of the great conductors including Abbado, Berglund, Boulez, Karajan, Guilini, Haitink, Harnoncourt, Maazel, Nezet-Seguin and Rattle. He is a passionate advocate of contemporary music, is the dedicatee of several works and has commissioned and performed a huge range of new works from composers such as Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, Sir James MacMillan, Nigel Osborne, Stuart MacRae and David Fenessy.  His work with Hebrides Ensemble, described by The Scotsman as ‘one of the most innovative and thrilling ensembles in Europe’ and now in its 25th year, underpins this commitment. By placing new music at the heart of a diverse range of repertoire, often in new and surprising contexts, Hebrides Ensemble encourages audiences to approach familiar music with fresh ears. His dedication to developing contemporary music has been recognised by an award from the Scottish Society of Composers for an outstanding contribution to new music.

As a conductor, he studied in Helsinki with Jukka-Pekka Saraste and was a finalist and prizewinner in the 1994 Leeds Conductors’ Competition. Since then, he has established himself as a conductor of versatility in chamber, symphonic and operatic repertoire and has conducted the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Royal Northern Sinfonia, English Sinfonia, Chamber Orchestra of Europe (with whom he has made a CD recording released by Warner), and the Symphony Orchestras of Cairo, Sofia, Zagreb, de Filharmonie of Flanders, the Belgian orchestra Beethoven Academie, Teatro di Cagliari, Göettingen and  the American Phoenix Symphony Orchestra in all repertoires from baroque to present day. He has conducted many operas and in 2018 he made his conducting debut at the BBC Proms in a performance of Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale. 

He is Music Director of Edinburgh Studio Opera and is Artistic Director and Head of Strings at St Mary’s Music School in Edinburgh.  He broadcasts regularly on BBC Radio 3 and has recorded for Deutsche Grammophon, Linn Records, Unicorn-Kanchana and Delphian Records in a series of highly successful recordings of music by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies and Sir James MacMillan which have both reached no 3 and no 1 respectively in the classical music charts. 

Refreshments available during the interval

St Mary’s Church, Hay-on-Wye

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate.

Anna-Marie Bacanu Marvic Monreal Ben Smith Jake Muffett

Hay Music welcomes an international cast of outstanding singers from The National Opera Studio in a programme of familiar and less familiar operatic arias and songs.

Programme details to follow

Soprano Anna-Maria Bacanu hails from Bucharest in Romania. At the age of 10, she was admitted into the Children’s Choir at Romania’s Radiobroadcast (Corul de Copii al Radiodifuziunii Romane) where she performed in both concerts and competitions in her home country and abroad, until she went to the National University of Music, Bucharest in 2011. In 2014, she began to perform at the Comic Opera in Bucharest, where roles included Konstanze Die Entführung aus dem Serail, Mademoiselle Silberklang Der Schauspieldirektor and Dochita in the operetta Crai Nou by Romanian composer Ciprian Porumbescu. She completed her Masters’ degree at the National University of Music in June 2018, where for her final exam she performed Donna Anna Don Giovanni. Ana-Maria has performed extensively on the concert platform, including engagements such as Mozart’s Requiem, Poulenc’s Gloria and Brahms’ Ein Deutsches Requiem with the Bacau State Philharmonic Orchestra. She has also taken part in numerous concerts at Peles Castle, Cantacuzino Castle, the Romanian Atheneum Hall and the Romanian Radio Hall. Ana-Maria is sincerely grateful for the continued guidance and support of her teacher, Bianca Manoleanu.

Anna-Maria is generously supported by The Carne Trust.

Maltese mezzo-soprano Marvic Monreal completed her two-year Opera Course at the Royal Academy of Music this year. Marvic also obtained her MA in Voice with distinction from the Royal Academy of Music. Before starting her studies in London, she completed a degree in Tourism Studies at the University of Malta. Marvic spent the summer of 2017 in Salzburg participating in the Young Singers Project: she had her debut at the Salzburg Festival with the role of Pisana I due foscari opposite Maestro Placido Domingo and tenor Joseph Calleja in the title roles. Recent performances include Joseph Calleja’s annual summer concert in Malta, where Marvic had the opportunity to share the stage with the tenor himself as well as Sir Bryn Terfel. She was the soloist in Mahler’s 2nd Symphony, conducted by Maestro Semyon Bychkov at the Royal Festival Hall, and a soloist in Beethoven’s 9th Symphony with the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Maestro Brian Schembri for Europe Day Concert earlier this year. Marvic was a Jerwood Young Artist at Glyndebourne Festival Opera in 2016. For Royal Academy Opera, she has had the pleasure to perform Bradamante Alcina, Venus Orphee aux enfers, Mrs. Peachum Die Dreigroschenoper, Older Woman Flight and Carmen La tragédie de Carmen. She is most grateful to the BOV Joseph Calleja Foundation for their continuing support. Marvic is also supported by an Independent Opera Fellowship. Last summer, Marvic participated in the Solti accademia di bel canto.

Marvic is generously supported by the Nicholas John Trust and a Glyndebourne New Generation Programme Young Artist Development Award.

Welsh tenor Ben Smith graduated from the RCM with a BMus (Hons) degree in Music before furthering his training on the Masters of Performance programme with Timothy Evans-Jones. During his time at the RCM, Ben was the Sir Peter and Lady Walters Soirée d’Or Scholar, was supported by a Douglas and Hilda Simmonds Scholarship as well as the Arts Council of Wales Advanced Study Award, the Ryan Davies Memorial Trust, the Henry Wood Accommodation Trust and the Josephine Baker Trust. In 2018, Ben was a member of the Glyndebourne chorus, performing in Giulio Cesare, Vanessa and Pelléas et Mélisande, the latter of which he also performed at the BBC Proms. Ben has worked with Neil Shicoff, and received guidance from Craig Rutenberg and Joyce Fieldsend. He was a 2016 Iford Arts Next Generation Artist and worked at Nevill Holt Opera in 2017, singing in the chorus of Tosca. Ben continues his studies with Marie McLaughlin. During his training at the RCM, Ben performed Pastore/Apollo L’Orfeo, Septimius Theodora and created the roles of Razomikhin and Devlin in a co-production with Tête a Tête Opera. He has sung Nemorino L’elisir d’amore for Arcadian Opera, Don Ottavio Don Giovanni for British Youth Opera, Tamino Die Zauberflöte for Chelmsford City Opera and Tybalt Romeo et Juliette for Opera at Bearwood. His solo performances have taken him to the Royal Albert Hall with the 1000 Welsh Male Voices, to St John Smith Square and to the Throne Room of Buckingham Palace for a performance of Vaughan Williams’ Serenade to Music under the baton of John Wilson. He was subsequently invited to perform with John Wilson and the CBSO at Symphony Hall, Birmingham in a semi-staged concert of The Yeomen of the Guard. Ben made his Wigmore Hall debut performing Habdonah Esther for the London Handel Festival. He is a former member of Classical Brit award-winning group Only Men Aloud.

Ben is generously supported by Sir Peter and Lady Walters and Chris Ball.

Baritone Jake Muffett was born and raised in Grantham, Lincolnshire. He graduated from the University of York with a BA (Hons) in Music and received an MMus in Vocal Performance from the Guildhall School of Music and Drama before completing their Opera Programme under Dominic Wheeler and Martin Lloyd-Evans. He is a vocal student of John Evans, and has been since beginning his postgraduate studies. Jake was one of the eight Monteverdi Choir apprentices for the academic year 2014/15. During this time, he worked closely with Sir John Eliot Gardiner, performing with the choir in concerts across Europe and the United States. Since completing the apprenticeship, he has continued to sing with the group on a regular basis, including various solo engagements. He was a member of the Glyndebourne Festival Chorus for the 2016 season, covering the role of Fiorello Il barbiere di Siviglia and performing a principal role in Glyndebourne Youth Opera’s production of Lewis Murphy’s A Garden Dream. Jake is delighted to have returned for the 2018 season as a Jerwood Young Artist. His most recent operatic engagements include the title role in Mozart’s Don Giovanni for British Youth Opera, the role of John Sorrell The Consul and Le Marquis de la Force/ 1st Officer Dialogues des Carmélites for GSMD. He made his major London solo debut at the Royal Albert Hall in Orff’s Carmina Burana with The Really Big Chorus conducted by Bob Chilcott, and sang again with the group for the 2017 performances of Handel’s Messiah, conducted by Ben Parry and Brian Kay. A keen semi-professional clarinettist, Jake still plays with orchestras and chamber groups when the opportunity arises. Jake is also supported by a Help Musicians UK Sybil Tutton Award.

Jake is generously supported by the Carne Trust, Chris Ball and a Glyndebourne New Generation Programme Young Artist Development Award.

Refreshments available during the interval

Richard Booth’s Bookshop, Hay-on-Wye

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate.

Beatrice Philips – violin    Venetia Jollands – violin    

Hannah Shaw – viola    Hannah Sloane – cello

Programme

Haydn:  String Quartet Op 9, No 1 

Bartók:  String Quartet No 3 

Beethoven:  String Quartet No 15 in A minor, Op. 132

Finalists of the 2018 Royal Overseas League Competition, The Eusebius Quartet are fast gaining a reputation for imaginative and communicative performances. Formed in autumn 2015, they were resident String Quartet at the Lewes Chamber Music Festival 2016 and 17 and at FitzFest, Fitzrovia’s newest music festival playing quartets by Schumann, Mendelssohn, Haydn and Bartok. Since forming the quartet they have appeared at numerous London venues including Conway Hall, St James’ Piccadilly, the Foundling Museum, Blackheath Halls as well as other venues across the country. 

The quartet enjoys exploring unusual repertoire and last year collaborated with pianist Alasdair Beatson in three performances of Gabriel Pierné's Piano Quintet. They have also performed with clarinettists Matt Hunt and Michael Collins and bassoonist Amy Harman and oboist Daniel Bates. The Eusebius Quartet performed live on BBC Radio 3’s In Tune before appearing as quartet-in-residence at the Wye Valley Chamber Music Festival 2017. Here, they performed Beethoven's Opus 132 and collaborated with Marie Bitloch of the Elias Quartet in a performance of Taneyev's String Quintet No.2. 

The Quartet returned to the Foundling Museum in Bloomsbury, London, in February 2017 with a concert coinciding with the launch of a new exhibition ‘Child's Play’. This project paired repertoire with particular paintings and themes from the museum's collection, preceded by a tour of local primary schools in Camden.  In May 2018, the quartet did a similar schools tour in Lewes, which took repertoire from the forthcoming Lewes Chamber Music Festival programme to five schools in the surrounding area. These projects give school children the opportunity to hear and interact with a professional live string quartet. 

The members of the quartet have played together in different formations for many years, having met as teenagers studying together and then again later at IMS Prussia Cove. After completing studies in London, New York, Helsinki, Paris and the Netherlands they have been very excited to reunite as a quartet, sharing their passion for the extraordinary music written for this formation. The quartet enjoys experimenting with different styles of playing, studying early Haydn editions as well as string quartet recordings made in the twenties and thirties and feel extremely lucky to have this opportunity to spend their lives exploring the intricacy and importance of fine quartet-playing today. 

The quartet takes its name from one of the two fictional characters invented by Robert Schumann for his musical journal writings. These characters became symbolic of Schumann’s opposing moods: the fiery and impassioned Florestan contrasted the more introverted and dreamy Eusebius. 

Refreshments available during the interval

St Mary’s Church, Hay-on-Wye

Please note:  time given for end of concert is approximate

By popular demand Hay Music is delighted

to welcome once again

the Choir of Clare College - Director Graham Ross

Since the founding of a mixed voice choir in 1972, the Choir of Clare College has gained an international reputation as one of the world’s leading university choirs. In addition to its primary function of leading services three times a week in the College chapel, the Choir keeps an active schedule recording, broadcasting, and performing. Former directors have included John Rutter and Timothy Brown. Under the direction of Graham Ross, Director of Music since 2010, it has been praised for its consistently ‘thrilling’ and ‘outstanding’ performances worldwide. Recent engagements include Handel’s Messiah with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment (OAE), Mozart’s Requiem with the Manchester Camerata, Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 and the world première of Alexander Raskatov’s Green Masswith the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO), Fauré’s Requiem with the Malaysian Philharmonic Orchestra, and concerts in Notre Dame Cathedral, Évron Basilica, the Howard Assembly Room and across the USA. The Choir’s 2018/19 schedule includes Bach’s Christmas Oratorio with the OAE, Britten’s War Requiem in King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, performances in Westminster Cathedral, St John’s Smith Square’s Christmas and Holy Week Festivals, Barcelona’s Le Palau, and tours of the USA, Canada, Mexico and Spain.

In addition to live performances, the Choir has produced an impressive discography of more than forty recordings. Their recordings under Graham Ross on the Harmonia Mundi label have been released to great critical acclaim, earning praise for ‘exceptional singing’ and ‘immaculate performances’, a Le Choix de France Musique and a Diapason d’Oraward, and garnering a Gramophone Award nomination. The Choir’s nine-disc series of Music for the Church Year has received numerous 5 star reviews in the national and international press, with recordings for Advent (2013), Passiontide (2014), Christmas (2014), Ascensiontide and Pentecost (2015), All Saints and All Souls (2015), Easter (2016), Epiphany (2017), Corpus Christi (2017) and Trinity (2018). The Choir’s album Remembrance featured as Classic FM’s Album of the Week, and other acclaimed recent recordings have included the first recording of choral works by Imogen Holst, and Reformation 1517-2017, a special album of music celebrating the quincentenary of the Reformation.

The Choir has toured widely, including in the United States of America, Australia, Japan, China, Singapore, Malaysia, Russia, the Middle East and mainland Europe. It has collaborated with the OAE in performances of Handel’s Jephtha under the direction of René Jacobs, with the Australian Chamber Orchestra in Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9, with the LPO at the Royal Festival Hall conducted by Sir Mark Elder and Vladimir Jurowski, and with many other ensembles including the Academy of Ancient Music, European Union Baroque Orchestra, Freiburger Barockorchester, Israel Camerata, Aurora Orchestra, the Schubert Ensemble and the Dmitri Ensemble. The Choir performs a wide range of repertoire throughout the year, and has commissioned and premièred works by many composers, including Herbert Howells, John Tavener, John Rutter, Giles Swayne, James Whitbourn, Andrew Carter, Jonathan Dove, Julian Phillips, Tarik O’Regan, Alexander Raskatov, Graham Ross, Brett Dean, Matthew Martin and Nico Muhly.

Refreshments available during the interval