Cambridge Summer Music

Back by popular demand…... The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain, seen and heard across the globe, is simultaneously provocative, entertaining and inspiring. Their shows combine music, humour and intelligence – with silliness! Using a menagerie of voices and cheap instruments, The Ukulele Orchestra of Great Britain elicits emotion and thought in unexpected forms and successfully mixes highbrow with lowbrow to appeal to an astonishingly broad audience: think Morecambe and Wise, explaining Joseph Beuys’ ‘Desert Island Discs’.

Wherever The Ukulele Orchestra performs, from Never Mind The Buzzcock’s Christmas Special, Jools Holland’s Hootenanny, to Blue Peter, to the smallest pub in England, they bring a hilarious style of music virtuoso that is all of their own.

The best musical entertainment in the country…worth travelling a thousand miles to hear.
The Independent

• Ric Elsworth Marimba

Ric plays the marimba in this inspiring percussion workshop. He was a finalist in the BBC Young Musician of the Year competition in 2004, and has hosted workshops for The Music Workshop Company, travelling all over the country to Primary Schools, corporate clients, and even parties in garages! Suitable for ages 7-11.

Choose from three sessions:
11 – 11.45 am
12 – 12.45 pm
1.30 – 2.15 pm

• Toru Takemitsu And then I knew ‘twas Wind
• Emily Hall Join
• Benjamin Britten Lachrymae
• Harrison Birtwistle Crowd
• Olivier Messiaen Le Merle Noir
• Claude Debussy Sonata for Flute, Viola and Harp

The London Sinfonietta is one of the world’s elite contemporary music ensembles with a reputation built on its virtuosity and ambitious programming, committed to placing new music at the heart of contemporary culture and pushing boundaries. Here, the Ensemble plays what has been described by the critics as a “a wonderful panorama of music from the last 100 years” with mouth-watering instrument combinations of flute, harp, viola and piano.

Wayne Weng piano

A luscious programme of virtuoso piano favourites including Chopin’s Ballade No 4 and Valses in A Minor and F Major, works by Albeniz and Ravel’s La Valse.
Born in 1983, Taiwanese-Canadian pianist Wayne Weng has recently won prizes at the Haverhill Sinfonia Soloists Competition, the Tunbridge Wells International Young Concert Artists Competition, and the Washington International Competition for Piano, where The Washington Post described his final round performance as “valiant… passionate… and raised the excitement level of the afternoon several notches”.

This recital is one of Wayne Weng’s Haverhill Competition prizes.

The Calvert-Turner Duo gave its first concert in 2003 and has performed in numerous venues across the UK to public acclaim. The pair’s energy and exuberance thrill audiences as they perform music from around the globe. The two instruments, harp and cello, will come to life in the wonderfully contrasting music of Ravi Shankar, Bach, Glazunov, De Falla, Mozart and Gershwin.

The Calvert-Turner cello and harp duo brought unlimited energy and virtuosity.
Herts Essex News

Festival Chorus

Cambridge Philharmonic Orchestra

Stephen Cleobury conductor
Laura Mitchell soprano Ruth Jenkins soprano
John McMunn tenor Sam Jenkins bass

• Mendelssohn Hebrides Overture ‘Fingal’s Cave’
• Mendelssohn Hear my Prayer
• Mozart Mass in C Minor

Mozart’s C Minor Mass — known also as the Grand Mass — is widely regarded as his most ambitious and elaborate choral masterpiece, though like his Requiem, unfinished. Mendelssohn’s well-known concert overture invokes the solitude and power of the cave and the surrounding sea, while his anthem includes the favourite aria O for the Wings of a Dove, magical here in this great space. The Festival Chorus, now in its third year, is comprised of members from up to fourteen massed Cambridgeshire Choirs including members of Cambridge University Musical Society and Cambridge Philharmonic Society who sing together under the direction of King’s College Choir’s Director, Stephen Cleobury.

• Mendelssohn Octet
• Haydn String Quartet Op 76 No 1 in G
• Haydn Op 50 No 1

For almost two hundred years, the Cambridge Union Society has stood as a vibrant centre of debate and free speech in British intellectual life. The historic debating chamber is the venue for one of the most popular chamber works of the repertoire, also just a little under 200 years old; Mendelssohn’s great Octet. Composed when Mendelssohn was only 16, the Octet has earned its place as a beloved classic of the chamber music repertoire. The Octet is framed by performances of Haydn quartets played by two brilliant young ensembles, the sought-after Doric and the Madrid-based Quiroga, both prizewinners of international competitions.

Thomas Leech

Thomas Leech combines his work as a Choral Director for the Diocese of Leeds with the Musical Directorships of Bradford Festival Choral Society and Sheffield Chorale, and enjoys growing acclaim as a recitalist and teacher. His programme includes Bach’s Toccata in C BWV 564, Mozart’s Fantasia in F minor and Maurice Duruflé’s Prélude et Fugue sur le nom d’Alain Op 7.

Music for a While

James Bowman sings Purcell and Handel with Canzona, director Theresa Caudle.

• Theresa Caudle, Jean Paterson violins
• Jane Norman viola
• Mark Caudle bass violin and viola
• Alastair Ross harpsichord and organ
• David Miller theorbo

A glorious synthesis of Handel and Purcell arias and instrumental works which includes Purcell’s Music for a While, the Theatre Suite The Gordian Knott Unty’d, and his Chacony in G minor, and Handel’s arias from Rinaldo, Ottone, the instrumental Trio Sonata V in G minor, and the Suite from Music in the play call’d the Alchemist.

Canzona has established itself as one of England’s leading ensembles specialising in the performance of baroque music on period instruments. The ensemble is in concert here with James Bowman, one of the world’s leading countertenors for nearly 30 years whose career spans opera, oratorio and contemporary music.

• Haydn Quartet in D Op 64 No 5 ‘The Lark’
• Beethoven String Quartet in F minor Op 95 ‘Serioso’
• Dvorák String Quartet in F Op 96 ‘American’

With their unique and spellbinding sound, heirs of the great school of Czech playing, the Wihan Quartet has made an impact in concert venues around the world. Written around the time of the New World Symphony, the American Quartet is one of the most loved works in the chamber repertoire; Beethoven’s short ‘serioso’ quartet written just before his late, final quartets, and Haydn’s The Lark make for a wonderful programme to be heard in the intimate surroundings of Jesus College Chapel.

It is an ideally balanced quartet with immaculate rapport…the playing is excellent…perfect articulation and intonation….sparkles with life
The Strad