FESTIVAL PROGRAMME  2009
 

Fri 25 September – Sat 3 October

[Click this for Programme brochure]

We have several themes this year under our umbrella title “Distant Voices” – first, there are celebrations for St Wilfrid, founder of the Abbey, on the 1300th anniversary of his death, and then there is a thread of “Eastern & Exotic” music with performers and composers representing music and sounds from the Middle and Far East, taking in Russia and Eastern Europe.

So far we have lined up the following artists and dates – but keep watching for the latest news!

[Click for the latest (but not prettiest!) programme]

Friday 25 Sept: Another evening at The Forum Cinema of silent film with live music + one of this year’s crop of professional performers at the threshold of their career in our Young Artists Platform.

Saturday 26 Sept: Hexham Abbey Festival Chorus & Orchestra conducted by David Murray. This year the chorus, joining in our Eastern theme, offer Dvorak’s Stabat Mater. A fully fledged Romantic score, rich and dark with Slavonic splendour. They are joined by an impressive line up of soloists: Claire McKenna (soprano), who hails from Northumberland, Joanna Gamble (mezzo-soprano), currently working with Welsh National Opera, the tenor Nicholas Ransley, and a return by bass Philip Smith.

Sunday 27 Sept: The Abbey’s Festival services again feature special music, with an orchestral Mass setting in the morning, and combined choirs of the Abbey and Newcastle Cathedral at Evensong.

Landermason return to their home in Hexham to launch their new CD at our Folk Day. Support will include a return – by public demand! – of last year’s Young Artists star, Laura-jayne Hunter, with her unique take on alternative acoustic folk.

Monday 28 Sept: Local talent again to the fore, as Michael Haynes, the Abbey’s organist, plays the Poulenc Organ Concerto on the Abbey’s Phelps organ. Those who know the work will recall a Tchaikovsky quote in the middle of it, but the programme also includes the real stuff! It concludes with the Tchaikovsky Serenade for strings, and in a Mendelssohn celebration year, includes one of his youthful, energetic string symphonies. The same description may be used of the orchestra for the occasion, the 3-year old Skipton Camerata, drawing on the best young players from the North on both sides of the Pennines.

Tuesday 29 Sept: Joglaresa appears in "Dancing in Tetuán". This lively and colourful early music & music-theatre group, with a sound that is at once traditional and contemporary - combines intoxicating elements of Middle Eastern, Latin and Celtic musics. With flamenco guitar, oud, darabuka, bendir, cláirseach and searing vocals they meld together a sound that is both extrovert and personal.

Wednesday 30 Sept: Very popular in 2007, Kosmos violinist Harriet Mackenzie, will give a recital with Anna Tilbrook (piano), to include the Sonata by Debussy, Beethoven’s D major Sonata, romantic music from Szymanovski and Bloch, Bartok’s attractive Roumanian Dances and the ethereal sounds of Arvo Pärt and Toru Takemitsu.

Thursday 1 October: Spanish guitarist and composer Eduardo Niebla is one of the most brilliant and emotive performers on the world circuit today. Don’t miss the opportunity to hear one of the world's great flamenco jazz guitar virtuosos Eduardo Niebla in concert with his fine trio, who include Carl Herring (guitar) & Dharmesh Parmar (tabla), in a tapestry of Eastern colours interwoven with passionate gypsy jazz flamenco.

Friday 2 October: The Times said “Elf like” of young Russian pianist Natalia Strelchenko, who skips on to the platform, and then astounds with playing of formidable talent and power. She made her debut with the St.Petersburg Conservatoire orchestra at the age of 13, and recently wowed both audiences and critics alike in recitals at London’s prestigious Wigmore Hall. Her Hexham programme includes Balakirev's electrifying tour de force "Islamey - Oriental Fantasy" and the music of Grieg just prior to her next Wigmore appearance.

Saturday 3 October: The incomparable HILLIARD ENSEMBLE perform their programme Arkhangelos, exotic and quasi oriental music of the Sharakans, with music which has its roots in the Greek, Russian, English and Roman churches, plus Armenian and Russian music rubbing shoulders with the atmospheric sounds of James Macmillan and Arvo Pärt.

The programme also includes the schools project performance, Young Artist Platform, and the traditional street festival entertainment and other community projects and events.

Join the Friends of the festival and make sure you receive your own brochure, along with the other benefits membership brings - priority booking, discounts, a newsletter and special events for Friends. See the Support page.

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