Press room
Full event details for Barbican own-promotion concerts Sep 2022 - Jan 2023
BARBICAN OWN PROMOTION CONCERTS
SEPTEMBER 2022 – JANUARY 2023
(in date order)
Venus, Cupid, Folly and Time – Thirty Years of The Divine Comedy
Wed 31 Aug – Sun 4 Sep 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £25 – 40 plus booking fee
A celebration of the band’s thirtieth anniversary, this five-night concert-run sees The Divine Comedy performing as an eleven-piece ensemble, playing two albums in full each night in chronological order as follows:
- Liberation / Promenade (Wed 31 Aug 2022)
- Casanova / A Short Album About Love (Thu 1 Sep 2022)
- Fin de Siecle / Regeneration (Fri 2 Sep 2022)
- Absent Friends / Victory For The Comic Muse (Sat 3 Sep 2022)
- Bang Goes The Knighthood / Foreverland (Sun 4 Sep 2022)
In 1990 Neil Hannon signed his first deal and started releasing records under the name The Divine Comedy. Thirty plus years, twelve great albums and hundreds of mesmerising live shows later, Hannon is rightly adjudged one of the finest singer-songwriters of his generation. The Divine Comedy return to the Barbican following their ‘Live from the Barbican’ date in October 2020.
The band will repeat the five nights at the Cité de la Musique in Paris 19 – 23 September 2022.
Produced by the Barbican
Academy of Ancient Music: Haydn’s The Seasons
Tues 4 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 50 plus booking fee
Academy of Ancient Music (AAM) launches 'Tis nature's voice, its season-long musical exploration of the environment and our place within it with Haydn's life-affirming oratorio, The Seasons. AAM Music Director Laurence Cummings conducts a world-beating team of soloists – including Sophie Bevan (soprano), Benjamin Hulett (tenor) and Jonathan Lemalu (bass-baritone) – in a performance co-produced by the Barbican. Striking new visuals created by digital projection specialists at Nina Dunn Studios bring The Seasons vividly to life and pull the imagination into Haydn's creative world.
Co-produced by the Barbican and AAM
ECHO Rising Stars and Guildhall Alumni Recital: James Newby
Fri 7 Oct 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £12 plus booking fee
Guildhall School of Music & Drama alumnus, BBC New Generation Artist and former Kathleen Ferrier Award winner, British baritone James Newby presents his ECHO Rising Stars London performance alongside pianist Joseph Middleton. The programme of songs and lieder by Britten, Beethoven, Mahler, Bingham, and Schubert features themes of restlessness, longing, loneliness, isolation and displacement. And it includes the world premiere of Newby’s ECHO commission, Judith Weir’s Casanova in Lockdown which is based on the witty text of Giacomo Casanova’s Histoire de ma Vie, as he longs for company and freedom whilst imprisoned.
This recital is part of ECHO Rising Stars and Guildhall School's Alumni Recital Series. With thanks for support from: Leche Trust, Golsoncott Foundation, Rainbow Dickinson Trust and Idlewild Trust.
Produced by the Barbican
Autechre
+ Zoviet France
Fri 7 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm & 10pm
Tickets £25 – 35 plus booking fee
Cutting-edge English electronic music duo Autechre, featuring Rob Brown and Sean Booth, will come to the Barbican for the first time this October, giving two performances in one evening.
Playing in darkness, this will be the first chance to hear new Autechre material since 2020’s SIGN and PLUS. With roots in 80's electro, their first release in 1991 developed a template for electronic music that stands firm today. Constantly evolving, the duo – so intertwined with the history of Warp Records – have created some of the most groundbreaking music of the last 30 years. With original sounds, intricately programmed funk and a characteristically northern take on conventional rhythm and structure, their style is always fresh and future-facing.
Support comes from Zoviet France – emerging from the experimental industrial scene in the 80s alongside the likes of Throbbing Gristle, Cabaret Voltaire and The Hafler Trio, this is a rare chance to catch them live.
Produced by the Barbican
Find out more
Dave Longstreth / Dirty Projectors / s t a r g a z e:
Song of the Earth
Sat 8 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 8pm
Tickets £20 – 25 plus booking fee
David Longstreth vocals, guitar
Felicia Douglass vocals
s t a r g a z e
André de Ridder conductor
Barbican audiences will be able to sample an exciting and relevant new project from American indie rockers Dirty Projectors, who have teamed up for this with contemporary-classical ensemble s t a r g a z e.
“Let’s do something new” said Dave Longstreth of the Dirty Projectors and André de Ridder, leader of the experimental Berlin orchestra collective
s t a r g a z e when they first met at the Sydney Festival in 2013. And indeed, the composer and frontman of the famous American rock band kept his word: Following one of his recent singles Earth Crisis, he now created Song of the Earth for the musicians of s t a r g a z e. Longstreth, who founded the Dirty Projectors back in 2002 in New York, explains: “In the 111 years since Gustav Mahler’s ›Song of the Earth‹ was first performed, our relationship to the earth has changed dramatically. So it seemed time to reframe that idea.”
Produced by the Barbican
Isata Kanneh-Mason in recital
Mon 10 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 50 plus booking fee
Brilliant young pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason returns to the Barbican for her first solo recital in the Barbican Hall. Kanneh-Mason has previously performed here with all six of her siblings, and on multiple occasions with cellist brother Sheku, but this time will sit centre-stage in a programme which brings a mature perspective to popular children’s tunes: Mozart’s playful variations on Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Debussy’s and Schumann’s depictions of childhood scenes. Also featured is the London Premiere and ECHO commission, Eleanor Alberga’s piece Cwiceolfor, (an ancient spelling of mercury, an element that fascinated her in her youth).
Isata Kanneh-Mason is the recipient of the 2021 Leonard Bernstein Award and an ECHO Rising Star in the 2021/22 season.
Produced by the Barbican
Tue 11 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £20 – 30 plus booking fee
Critically acclaimed Grammy-nominated saxophonist, bandleader and composer Ravi Coltrane brings his Cosmic Music project to the Barbican this autumn. A contemporary exploration into the music of his parents, saxophonist John Coltrane and pianist Alice Coltrane, Ravi Coltrane will be joined on stage by his quartet, featuring Gadi Lehavi (piano), Dezron Douglas (bass), and Elé Howell (drums).
In the course of a twenty plus year career, Ravi Coltrane has worked as a sideman to many, and recorded noteworthy albums for himself and others.
Additional credits include performances as well as recordings with Elvin Jones, Terence Blanchard, Kenny Baron, Steve Coleman, McCoy Tyner, Jack DeJohnette, Matt Garrison, Jeff ‘Tain’ Watts, Geri Allen, Joanne Brackeem, The Blue Note 7, among others. Born in Long Island, the second son of John Coltrane and Alice Coltrane, Ravi was named after Indian sitar legend Ravi Shankar. He was raised in Los Angeles where his family moved after his father’s death in 1967. His mother, Alice Coltrane, was a significant influence on Ravi and it was he who encouraged Alice to return to performance and the recording studio after a long absence. Subsequently, Ravi produced and played on Alice Coltrane’s powerful, ‘Translinear Light’, which was released in 2004.
Produced by the Barbican
Sat 8 – Sun 16 October 2022, Barbican Centre
Tickets £10 – £100 plus booking fee
Darbar Festival makes a long-awaited return to live performances in 2022 after the COVID-19 pandemic. Now in its 17th year, this year’s programme at the Barbican features a magical mix of emerging raw young talent from India and the UK, master performers making their UK debuts and performances featuring world class legends, maestros and maestras. Darbar Festival 2022 will focus on wellbeing with yoga and breathwork sessions complementing the concert programme alongside an Indian music appreciation course.
Artists as part of the line-up include: Shubha Mudgal, Purbayan Chatterjee, Rakesh Chaurasia, Uday Bhawalkar, Bharathi Prathap, Wahane Sisters Duo and Rajrupa Chowdhury.
Darbar was set up in memory of Gurmit Singh Ji Virdee, an inspirational tabla player and teacher, the Festival continues to be the perfect place to discover an enchanting world of melody and rhythm.
Presented by Darbar in partnership with the Barbican
Find out more here and here.
Alison Balsom and Anna Lapwood
Fri 14 Oct 2022, St Giles Cripplegate, 7.30pm
Tickets £20- 30 plus booking fee
This October recital in the intimate surroundings of St Giles Cripplegate brings together award-winning trumpeter Alison Balsom in a rare live appearance alongside trailblazing young organist Anna Lapwood in what promises to be a collaboration not to be missed. Programme to include works by Bach, Albinoni, Debussy and Owain Park.
Produced by the Barbican
Thu 27 – Sun 30 Oct 2022, The Pit
Thu 27, 3pm & 8pm (press performance)
Fri 28, 8pm
Sat 29, 3pm (BSL / audio described performance) & 8pm
Sun 30, 3pm
Tickets £35 plus booking fee
An Anatomy of Melancholy – a new theatrical creation, which will be performed in the round in the intimate setting of The Pit – is a portrait of a man engaged in a forensic examination of his own sadness. Drawing on the work of Robert Burton (The Anatomy of Melancholy), Sigmund Freud (Mourning and Melancholia), as well as Darian Leader (The New Black) and other contemporary psychoanalysts, it takes inspiration from the notion of art as a consolation. Countertenor Iestyn Davies, lutenist Thomas Dunford and director Netia Jones present this staged performance with live and immersive video projection, featuring some of the most exquisite and heart-rending music ever composed: the songs of melancholy by English Renaissance composer John Dowland.
This world premiere production examines humanity’s relationship with melancholy – both the emotional and the scientific. Performed on stage as protagonist and commentator, the evening will reflect on ideas about mourning and melancholia, scientific and analytic responses to loss and melancholy, its botanical and pharmaceutical remedies, the emotional meeting point between intense beauty and overwhelming sadness, and the recurring idea of the powerful consolation that art can provide.
These performances have been kindly supported by Wellcome.
Produced by the Barbican
The Barbican’s International Associate Ensemble at Milton Court, the Australian Chamber Orchestra, and Artistic Director Richard Tognetti return this autumn for a three-day residency (27 – 29 October 2022), bringing their trademark virtuosity and artistry in three very different programmes across Milton Court and Barbican Hall that will show off the orchestra at its super-charged best.
Australian Chamber Orchestra: Beethoven and Bridgetower
Thu 27 Oct 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
Australian Chamber Orchestra
Richard Tognetti director & violin
William Barton didgeridoo & voice
William Barton Didge Fusion
Thomas Adès Shanty – Over The Sea
Ruth Crawford Seeger Andante for Strings
Leoš Janáček String Quartet No 1, Kreutzer Sonata (arr Tognetti)
George Walker Lyric for Strings
Ludwig van Beethoven Sonata No 9 in A major, Op 47 Bridgetower (arr Tognetti)
The first concert, Beethoven and Bridgetower, includes Beethoven’s passionate and iconic Violin Sonata in A major, Op.47. But there’s also drama off-stage in what is arguably Beethoven’s most loved and performed violin sonata: known as the Kreutzer for its dedication to the violinist Rudolphe Kreutzer (who likely never played this titanic work), what has been lost in history is its original dedication to George Bridgetower, a far more accomplished violinist of mixed European and West Indian descent, who performed with the composer at the Sonata’s premiere.
Legend has it Beethoven was so late to finish the Sonata that the ink was still wet on the page when he and Bridgetower – the latter, not having seen the score before, sight-reading and even improvising a section – took to the stage for an early morning performance. It was a success, and a jubilant Beethoven signed the manuscript in dedication to his friend. However, in its success lay its downfall. While celebrating, Beethoven and Bridgetower spectacularly fell out, and Bridgetower’s name was removed from the dedication, and from history.
With these infamous origins, it is no wonder such an intensely romantic piece not only inspired Tolstoy’s novella of jealousy and murder stemming from a performance of The Kreutzer, but also stirred Janáček’s Kreutzer Sonata as a response to Tolstoy’s story and views on women, pushing the string quartet to its limits and beyond.
Here, Artistic Director Richard Tognetti and the ACO take both Beethoven’s and Janáček’s masterpieces to another level, expanding them for full orchestra.
Also featured in this opening concert is regular ACO collaborator William Barton who will bring a spellbinding blend of vocals and didgeridoo playing; as well as works by kindred spirits in the form of Thomas Adès, Ruth Crawford Seeger and George Walker, providing a contemporary contrast while embracing the same revolutionary spirit.
This performance is supported by the Australian Government as part of the UK/Australia Season 2021-22
Produced by the Barbican
Australian Chamber Orchestra: River
Fri 28 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
Australian Chamber Orchestra
Richard Tognetti musical director, composer, artistic director & lead violin
William Barton composer & voice
Nigel Jamieson staging director
Damien Cooper lighting design
Jennifer Peedom film director
Featuring music by Vivaldi, Bach, Sibelius, Jonny Greenwood, Pēteris Vasks, Thomas Adès, Ravel, Radiohead, Mahler, William Barton, Richard Tognetti and Piers Burbrook de Vere.
In this latest fusion of sound, image, and primal awe, the Australian Chamber Orchestra bring River, the Orchestra’s acclaimed cinematic collaboration with filmmaker Jennifer Peedom, to the Barbican Hall. A cinematic and musical odyssey, written by writer Robert Macfarlane and narrated by actor Willem Dafoe, the film explores the remarkable relationship between humans and rivers. With an epic orchestral soundtrack curated by ACO Artistic Director Richard Tognetti and performed live by the ACO, River includes music by Jonny Greenwood and Radiohead alongside works by Vivaldi, Bach and Tognetti himself. Following similar performances of Reef in 2017 and Mountain in 2018 this project continues the ACO’s focus on the natural world and humanity’s fascination with it.
Presented by Screen Australia and the Australian Chamber Orchestra in association with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the BBC. A Stranger Than Fiction Films production in association with Arrow Pictures.
This performance is supported by the Australian Government as part of the UK/Australia Season 2021-22
Produced by the Barbican
Australian Chamber Orchestra: Indies and Idols
Sat 29 Oct 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
Australian Chamber Orchestra
Richard Tognetti director & violin
Musicians from Guildhall School of Music & Drama
Witold Lutosławski ‘Prologue’ from Musique Funebre
Bryce Dessner Réponse Lutoslawski
Wojciech Kilar Orawa
Krzysztof Penderecki ‘Aria’ from Three Pieces in Baroque Style
Krzysztof Penderecki String Quartet No 1
Jonny Greenwood Selected movements from There Will Be Blood: Suite
Karol Szymanowski String Quartet No 2 (arr Tognetti)
Richard Tognetti and the Australian Chamber Orchestra present music by indie icons Jonny Greenwood and Bryce Dessner alongside works by composers such as Szymanowski, Penderecki and Lutosławski, exploring how the kaleidoscopic dissonances and tripped-out textures of 20th-century Polish classical music ended up inspiring some of the boldest sounds in 21st-century culture. This concert will be performed side-by-side with musicians from Guildhall School.
This performance is supported by the Australian Government as part of the UK/Australia Season 2021-22
Produced by the Barbican
Souad Massi
+ Ruba Shamshoum
Sat 29 Oct 2022, Barbican Hall, 8pm, Tickets
Tickets £20 – 25 plus booking fee
Algerian chaâbi-folk icon Souad Massi returns to the Barbican in October 2022, bringing her light, melodic songs of folk balanced with pop, as found in Oumniya (my wish), her sixth album which came out in October 2019. Her material includes themes around Algeria, politics, love, freedom and emancipation. Soaud Massi last performed at the Barbican in an exciting double bill with Le Trio Joubran in May 2015.
Support comes from Palestinian singer and musician Ruba Shamshoum, whose riveting combination of poetic dream pop, jazz and Middle Eastern soul tells bold stories of femininity and vulnerability, and celebrates human connection to nature and one’s self.
Produced by the Barbican in association with Marsm
Clare Hammond: Ghosts & Whispers
Mon 30 Oct 2022, Barbican Cinema 1, 7pm
Tickets £15 plus booking fee
Clare Hammond piano
Pianist Clare Hammond brings an unbroken sequence of fragments, last thoughts, elegies and absences by Franz Schubert, Wolfgang A Mozart, Richard Wagner, Leoš Janáček, Igor Stravinsky, Elisabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre and Robert Schumann, interposed with movements from John Woolrich’s Pianobooks, to Barbican Cinema 1. The performance will take place in complete darkness (other than the projections) and audiences will be immersed in an unpredictable and unsettling array of differing sound worlds, perpetually disorientated by a succession of shadows, illusions and broken promises that gradually slides into darkness, erasure and death. The programme is performed alongside specially conceived images from iconic masters of stop-motion animation, the Quay Brothers.
Produced by the Barbican
Aoife O’Donovan
+ Donovan Woods
Wed 2 Nov 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £20 – 25 plus booking fee
Grammy award-winning Irish-American vocalist and songwriter Aoife O’Donovan makes her Barbican music programme debut in Nov 2022, in an intimate concert at Milton Court Concert Hall, performing solo and with a string quartet featuring fiddle player Jeremy Kittel.
Recognised for her ethereal voice and substantive songwriting, Aoife O’Donovan is also known for her collaborations. Her most recent one being the band project I’m With Her, comprised of O’Donovan and fellow singer-songwriters Sara Watkins and Sarah Jarosz. Their debut album, See You Around, was released in February 2018 to critical acclaim.
As a solo artist, O’Donovan has released three studio albums to date: her debut solo album, 2013's Fossils, In the Magic Hour (2016) and the recent Age of Apathy (2022). O'Donovan spent the preceding decade as co-founder and front woman of the bluegrass string band Crooked Still. She is the featured vocalist on The Goat Rodeo Sessions, the Grammy-winning album by Yo-Yo Ma, Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer and Chris Thile
Throughout her career, Aoife O’Donovan has also collaborated with artists such as Alison Krauss and jazz trumpeter Dave Douglas and spent a decade as a member of the house band on Live From Here, the US radio variety show.
Support comes from Canadian folk and country singer-songwriter Donovan Woods.
Produced by the Barbican
Find out more
Youssou N’Dour
Thu 3 Nov 2022, Barbican Hall, 8pm
Tickets £30 – 45 plus booking fee
Senegalese music icon, singer-songwriter Youssou N’Dour makes a long-awaited return to the Barbican this November, presenting new material from his 2021 album Mbalax alongside his band Super Étoile de Dakar.
Throughout his decades-long career, Youssou N’Dour’s roots in Senegalese traditional music and griot storytelling have remained the hallmark of his artistic personality. A daring innovator and staunch protector of the unique “Dakar overgroove,” N’Dour and his high-energy Super Étoile manage to fashion a sound that is both characteristically Senegalese and outward-looking, a contagiously exciting synthesis of musical languages.
Produced by the Barbican
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra/Daniel Harding/Leonidas Kavakos
Fri 4 Nov 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 75 plus booking fee
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra/Daniel Harding
Sat 5 Nov 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 75 plus booking fee
The remarkable Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra makes a long-awaited return to the Barbican this November with a two-night residency alongside conductor Daniel Harding.
The first programme features Brahms’ only Violin Concerto with soloist Leonidas Kavakos, recognized across the world as an artist of rare quality, acclaimed for his matchless technique, his superb musicianship, and the integrity of his playing. Also on the programme will be Beethoven’s Symphony No. 6, commonly known as the Pastoral Symphony.
The orchestra’s second performance on Sat 5 Nov juxtaposes two works – one old, one new – fraught with tension and shrouded in darkness: the UK Premiere of Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra commissioned Rick van Veldhuizen’s mais le corps taché dombres – a tense, writhing work with echoes of Mahler’s swooping strings and the extremely tight-knit counterpoint found in Berg and Ligeti; alongside Mahler’s haunting final symphony, Symphony No. 9.
Produced by the Barbican
MoodSwing: Joshua Redman, Brad Mehldau, Christian McBride and Brian Blade
Mon 14 Nov 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £30 – 49.50 plus booking fee
Performing tracks from the record, along with new material, the jazz supergroup reunites for this very special show. MoodSwing broke the mould for jazz recordings in the 1990s, creating a sound that reached beyond cerebral arrangements and delivered contemporary jazz with emotion and expression.
Produced by the Barbican in association with Serious
ECHO Rising Stars: Diana Tishchenko
Fri 18 Nov 2022, LSO St Luke’s, 1pm
Tickets £12 plus booking fee
Ukrainian-born, Berlin-based violinist Diana Tishchenko, nominated by Cité de la Musique/Philharmonie de Paris and Casa da Música, Porto, will present her ECHO Rising Stars London performance at LSO St Luke’s on Fri 18 Nov. Programme details to be confirmed.
This recital is part of ECHO Rising Stars. With thanks for support from: Leche Trust, Golsoncott Foundation, Rainbow Dickinson Trust and Idlewild Trust.
Produced by the Barbican
Find out more
Carducci Quartet: Fanny and Felix
Thu 24 Nov 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
Following the Carducci Quartet’s performance of the works, life and letters of Dmitry Shostakovich as part of Barbican Presents in 2021, the quartet returns to Milton Court Concert Hall this November. This time they will explore the intense connection between the two Mendelssohn siblings, through the composers’ music and spoken word excerpts adapted from Myla Lichtman-Fields’s play, Fanny and Felix.
The 19th Century’s musical scene was overshadowed by gender inequality. ‘Music will perhaps become his profession, while for you it can and must be only an ornament’ wrote Fanny’s father to her in 1820. Struggling with conflicting impulses of authorship versus social expectations, Fanny Mendelssohn spent most of her lifetime restricted to private performances and watching her brother take credit for music she’d written.
In this Milton Court performance as part of the Barbican’s music programme, the Carducci Quartet places Fanny’s music firmly centre stage, as letters between the siblings, adapted into a two-person play by Myla Lichtman-Fields, interweave the movements of her expressive String Quartet and a selection from her ground-breaking Das Jahr. Performed music by Felix Mendelssohn includes movements from String Quartets nos.1, 2 and 6, the Overture and Wedding March from A Midsummer Night’s Dream and On Wings of Song.
Produced by the Barbican
Julia Holter: The Passion of Joan Arc
dir. Carl Theodor Dreyer. France 1928, 88 mins. Cert PG.
Fri 25 Nov 2022, Barbican Hall, 8pm
Tickets £15 – 25 plus booking fee
In this special event in November 2022, the emotionally charged sound world of Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter, composer and producer Julia Holter meets the intensely expressionistic universe of a landmark of early cinema – director Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 film The Passion of Joan of Arc.
Commissioned by Opera North Projects, and originally planned for summer 2020 but postponed due to the pandemic, Holter can finally present her new soundtrack for this silent masterpiece, scored for and performed with the 36-strong Chorus of Opera North, plus her own band – Sarah Belle Reid, Corey Fogel and Tashi Wada.
Over the course of her five studio albums, Julia Holter has pushed into new territories, experimenting with vocals, song-writing and musical structure. The commission to score Dreyer’s visionary film about the martyrdom of the French saint, gave her an opportunity to dig deeper into her fascination with the music and art of the medieval era.
While lockdowns have frustrated the project’s schedule, the last two years have brought even more acclaim for Holter as a soundtrack composer, with the film Never Rarely Sometimes Always, featuring her original score, taking awards at Sundance and Berlin International Film Festival.
From its very first screening, various soundtracks have been created for Dreyer’s The Passion of Joan of Arc, with music by composers as diverse as Nick Cave and J S Bach. On its release in 1928, the film caused a minor scandal. Condemned unseen in France, vilified by Catholic authorities and also banned in England for its depiction of English soldiers, it is now recognised as a cinematic masterpiece, startlingly ahead of its time. Based on the actual transcription of the trial, its claustrophobic close-ups and striking performance by Renée Maria Falconetti give an evocative account of the French heroine’s final moments.
Julia Holter’s new score for Joan of Arc will receive its world premiere at the Huddersfield Contemporary Music Festival on 23 November 2022.
Commissioned and produced by Opera North Projects. Co-produced by the Barbican, the Brudenell Social Club and hcmf.
Samantha Ege: Black Renaissance
Music, Lives and Legacy
Tue 29 Nov 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 35 plus booking fee
Following her acclaimed presentation of Fantasie Nègre – a recital celebrating the work of three extraordinary 20th century female composers –pianist and musicologist Samantha Ege returns to Milton Court Concert Hall in November 2022. Giving marginalised composers their rightful voice, her recital focuses on the 20th-century Black Renaissance, featuring works by Robert Nathaniel Dett, Zenobia Powell Perry, Samuel Coleridge Taylor, Nora Holt, William Grant Still, and Florence Price.
Samantha Ege celebrates these composers, bringing to life their vibrant music which merges the worlds of late nineteenth-century romanticism and African and African American folk melodies.
Following Samantha Ege’s solo performances in the first half of the concert, fellow pianist Artina McCain joins her on stage for a second half of virtuosic two-piano orchestral arrangements. This reflects a historically informed performance approach – Black Renaissance composers did not always have access to orchestras due to the discrimination they faced in the mainstream classical scene and a lack of resources in Black classical communities. As a result, two-piano arrangements became a way for them to demonstrate their talents. These arrangements weren't rehearsal scores, they were symphonic showcases.
Produced by the Barbican
Sinfonia of London/John Wilson
Fri 2 Dec 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
John Wilson and his specially selected players that make up the Sinfonia of London mark their Barbican debut with a UK premiere performance of the original ballet version of Maurice Ravel’s most enduringly popular work Boléro. The orchestra will also be joined by mezzo-soprano Alice Coote for Ravel’s Shéhérazade.
Further featured as part of the programme will be rarely recorded English and French music for which Sinfonia of London has made its name, such as
William Walton’s Scapino and Henri Dutilleux’s Le Loup; alongside Gershwin’s gloriously jazzy American in Paris suite.
A recording ensemble of the 1950s and 60s re-launched by Wilson in 2018, Sinfonia of London features hand-picked players from across the world, many principals and soloists in their own right.
Produced by the Barbican
Sō Percussion with Caroline Shaw
Sun 4 Dec 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 22.50 plus booking fee
Brooklyn-based contemporary ensemble Sō Percussion returns to the Barbican’s music programme with this special date at Milton Court Concert Hall in December. They will open the evening with Angelica Negron’s Gone, played on custom-made Bricolo robotic instruments. This will be followed by a performance of Julia Wolfe’s Forbidden Love.
In the second half of this evening’s performance, award-winning composer Caroline Shaw joins the group for selections from her two 2021 albums – both written in collaboration with Sō Percussion and both drawing on Shaw’s melting pot of inspirations: rhythm, nature, literary quotes and hymns. Narrow Sea moves with the ebbs and flows of water, creating a timeless sense of movement. Let the Soil Play Its Simple Part sparkles with a heavenly beauty.
Sō Percussion is an American four-piece ensemble with international recognition for their original compositions, percussion performances and education projects. They last appeared at the Barbican in autumn 2017, presenting an audio-visual exploration of the social history of British coal mining, From Out a Darker Sea. They also previously performed here as part of Bryce Dessner and Nico Muhly’s marathon weekends.
Produced by the Barbican
Seven Septets
Tue 6 Dec 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 25 plus booking fee
This special concert date at Milton Court Concert Hall as part of the Barbican’s music programme sees seven unique musical voices in seven specially-created new works. Classical, Jazz and experimental improvisation fuse in a showcase of cutting-edge music from some of today’s most exciting composer-performers on the UK’s music scene. All multi-instrumentalists in their own rights, each takes a turn to lead with a musical concept of their own, while the remainder of the group react to illuminate these ideas with their own semi-improvised accompaniment.
This evening’s line-up includes Jas Kayser, a drummer for major pop artists; multidisciplinary percussionist and artist Angela Wai Nok Hui; ‘boundary-blurring composer and improviser’ (Guardian) Fred Thomas; BBC Jazz Award winner Kit Downes; Héloïse Werner – co-director of 2021 RPS Young Artist Award winners The Hermes Experiment; cellist, vocalist and composer Laura Moody, and composer, cellist and record label founder Colin Alexander.
Produced by the Barbican
Wed 7 Dec 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 45 plus booking fee
Allan Clayton tenor
Kate Golla piano
Lindy Hume director
David Bergman videographer
Fred Williams OBE (1927 – 1982) images
Paul Kildea Artistic Director
Franz Schubert Winterreise
One of the most sought-after singers of his generation, British tenor Allan Clayton is joined by pianist Kate Golla to perform Schubert’s mighty song cycle Winterreise in the Barbican Hall in a concert that also celebrates the art and work of the late Australian landscapist Fred Williams (1927-1982). The concert will be performed amidst projections of Fred Williams’ paintings and prints, with direction from Lindy Hume and videography from David Bergman.
Part of Barbican Presents
A Musica Viva Australia production
Thu 15 Dec 2022, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 40 plus booking fee
Leading period violinist, Rachel Podger, returns to the Barbican’s music programme following her acclaimed interpretation of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons with the AAM as part of Live from the Barbican in June 2021.
This December she presents a recital for solo violin at Milton Court Concert Hall, including well-known and rare unaccompanied works for Baroque violin, which will also be featured in Rachel Podger’s upcoming solo album (to be released later this year). The performance is bookended by Bach – opening with his Toccata and fugue BWV 565, arr for solo violin in A minor by Chad Kelly and closing with the Cello Suite No 6 in G major, transposed for violin. Also featured in the programme are works by Baroque period composers Nicola Matteis Jr, Johann Joseph Vilsmayr, Johann Paul von Westhoff, Guiseppe Tartini and a Suite of short movements from the Noguiera and Klagenfurt manuscripts. There will also be one contemporary piece as part of the programme – Phantasia for solo violin, written especially for Rachel Podger by her regular collaborator Chad Kelly who says: “After several fruitful collaborations, Rachel asked if I would write a piece for her. With neither of us certain what style or structure we wanted, Phantasia is an impulsive and improvisatory exploration of a variety of styles. The spectre of Bach as organist looms large, as does the evocation of Gregorian chant."
Alongside recording and performances, Rachel is a dedicated educator and regularly teaches at the Royal Academy of Music where she holds an honorary chair, at The Juilliard School in New York and at the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama.
Charpentier at Christmas
Mon 19 Dec 2022, Barbican Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 50 plus booking fee
Les Arts Florissants led by William Christie return to the Barbican Hall this Christmas following their critically acclaimed performance of Handel’s pastoral ode of L'Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato in March. For this seasonal concert they will perform some of Marc-Antoine Charpentier’s most invigorating but rarely performed Nativity music: the brief but beautiful Antiennes ‘O’ de l’Avent, interwoven with two instrumental Noëls, as they would have been incorporated into 17th-century French Advent liturgy. Also part of the programme is Charpentier’s colourful oratorio In Nativitatem Domini Canticum, with its particularly jubilant depiction of the shepherds’ journey to Jerusalem.
Produced by the Barbican
The Hermes Experiment & Shiva Feshareki
Thu 26 Jan 2023, Milton Court Concert Hall, 7.30pm
Tickets £15 – 35 plus booking fee
Winners of the Royal Philharmonic Society Young Artist Award 2021, vibrant contemporary quartet The Hermes Experiment collaborate with composer and turntablist Shiva Feshareki for this Milton Court Concert Hall date as part of the Barbican’s music programme in January 2023.
This concert is dedicated to the memory of artist and composer Mira Calix, with the programme including Oliver Leith’s Uh huh, Yeah, Stevie Wishart’s Eurostar – a journey between cities in sound, Mira Calix’s DMe, Jethro Cooke & The Hermes Experiment’s Metropolis and the premiere performance of a new Barbican co-commissioned work by Shiva Feshareki.
The Hermes Experiment is made up of harp, clarinet, voice and double bass. Capitalising on their deliberately idiosyncratic combination of instruments, the ensemble regularly commissions new works, as well as creating their own innovative arrangements and venturing into live free improvisation. The ensemble has commissioned over 60 composers at various stages of their careers. They have released two albums, HERE WE ARE and SONG, both on Delphian Records to critical acclaim.
Produced by the Barbican
Annikaisa Vainio-Miles, Senior Communications Manager : +44 (0)20 7382 7090, [email protected]
Sabine Kindel, Communications Manager: +44 (0)20 7382 6199, [email protected]
Simone Gibbs, Communications Assistant: [email protected]
