Frequently Asked Questions

If you’ve never been to one of our Sheffield concerts before, then you can enjoy your first performance for just £5*. A maximum of two tickets can be purchased per household. Offer only available in person or by phone through the Sheffield Theatres box office (0114 249 6000).

This offer applies to all our Sheffield concerts with the exception of Sheffield Jazz.

If you are in receipt of PIP or Universal Credit, please tell the staff at box office when booking your tickets and ask for a concessionary priced ticket. If you are booking online for our concerts in Sheffield this autumn, please select the ‘Unemployed’ ticket category. We are working with box office to update the wording for this ticket category for our spring 2023 season to better reflect who is now entitled to purchase these tickets.

The Crucible Studio Theatre is a flexible theatre space, with options to have seating on 1, 2, 3 or 4 sides of the auditorium. Most Music in the Round concerts in the Studio use seating on all 4 sides with the musicians sitting in the centre of the audience (in the round).  

Seating is unreserved for this concert space, but you must choose from 3 different seating areas when purchasing your tickets. 

Stage level consists of raked seating with wheelchair spaces at the ground level for those who require it (please note you will need to have registered as a wheelchair user with Sheffield Theatres box office to book wheelchair spaces online – call 0114 249 6000 to do this). 

Tier 1 is a single row of seating around the full perimeter of the auditorium with an elevated view of the stage. 

Tier 2 is a single row of seating around the full perimeter of the auditorium, above Tier 1, and looks down onto the stage from above.  

We would recommend Stage Level for anyone requiring easy access to their seats, as you are required to climb several sets of stairs to access Tier 1 and Tier 2 (we regret that there is no lift alternative).  

When the piano features in a concert, and if there is an interval, we will rotate the position of the piano on the stage by 180 degrees during the interval, to give as many people as possible in the audience the opportunity to view the keyboard during the performance. The lid is always removed from the piano, to avoid an obscured view of the pianist from any audience angle.  

Upper Chapel is a beautiful, traditional church setting in the heart of Sheffield city centre. 

Seating is unreserved for this concert space, but you must choose from 2 different seating areas when purchasing your tickets. 

Stage Level is on the ground floor. There are a limited number of spaces for wheelchairs, please book in advance if required.   

As the name suggests, the balcony overlooks the main seating area of the church. Seats are limited because of the restricted view of the stage from this area. You will need to climb some stairs to access the seats in this area.  

Seats are all on wooden pews, so some people find it preferable to bring a cushion for additional comfort.  

Unreserved, full capacity seating is now back in place in the Crucible Studio Theatre, Upper Chapel, Sheffield and Emmanuel Church, Barnsley.

Although they are not mandatory from 27 January, the guidance from the UK Government is to continue to wear a face covering over your nose and mouth in crowded and indoor spaces where you may come into contact with people you do not normally meet.

✔ Free, printed brief programmes for our concerts will be provided, but we will also make full programme notes available online in advance of the concert, so you can read them before or after the concert if you prefer.

✔ Please do not bring any unnecessary belongings with you to concerts. We politely request that you do not use the seats in front or behind you to store things.

✔ Hand-sanitiser and disposable face-masks will be available on the door.

✔ The Crucible and Studio auditorium air handling units will supply purified fresh air that is not recirculated and improvements have been made to increase natural ventilation throughout the building. All air handling systems and ventilation strategies have been reviewed for Sheffield Theatres based on the Ventilation Guidance.

✔ Sheffield Theatres’ cleaning teams are working throughout the day to ensure their spaces receive additional regular cleaning before, during and after your visit. This includes toilets, tables and chairs, handrails and all contact surfaces.

Anyone who shows any Covid-19 symptoms, including a raised temperature or cough must stay at home and isolate in line with Public Health England guidelines. If you have a raised temperature at the time of arrival, are showing signs of a continuous cough or any other recognised Covid-19 symptoms, we regret that you will not be permitted into the building under any circumstances.

Should the concert have to be cancelled for any reason, full refunds or credit notes will be offered to all ticket-holders.

Our online Festival events for Sheffield Chamber Music Festival 2021 have all now expired, but you can still find a good selection of recordings from previous concerts on our YouTube channel here.

You can donate online here. Every pound given makes a difference to us, and we are extremely grateful to our many supporters.

Many of our supporters become Friends of Music in the Round. You can join the Friends with a gift of £85 per year (£110 joint membership) or become a 360 Friend to give a little extra at £120 per year (£150 joint membership). Friends receive invitations to special events and Newsletters throughout the year. To give at a higher level, such as sponsoring a concert or supporting a specific project, please email Verity Henderson, Development Manager at verity@musicintheround.co.uk to discuss ways that we can work in partnership.

360° video, also sometimes known as ‘virtual reality’ or VR, is a way of capturing footage with a camera that looks in all directions simultaneously, allowing us to present Ensemble 360 in 360 degrees, and Music in the Round…in the round! This produces video that means you can choose where you look, and also includes spatial sound to replicate the real world, so what you hear changes as you look around.

360° video is not intended for watching either directly on television, or via chromecast devices from a laptop.

No, you can watch 360 content on your tablet, smartphone or computer as you would any other video. If you have access to a VR headset, then this can also be viewed in that way, but we have made these experiences for viewing without any special equipment.

360° video is not intended for watching either directly on television, or via chromecast devices from a laptop.

On a tablet or smartphone, physically moving the device will change your perspective, as if it were a frame through which you view the performance. On a touch screen, you can scroll around by using your finger to push or pull what you can see, as you would when flicking through photos or a webpage. On the screen of a computer, you can drag the image using a mouse, or touchpad, or click on the circular navigation in the top left of the screen, where the arrows indicate the direction in which you will travel.

Unfortunately, although most browsers support 360 video, not all of them do. If you can’t see a circular navigation tool in the top left of the screen, then it’s worth checking on a different browser too (for example, view in Safari instead of Chrome) and/or check to see if you need to update your current browser to a more recent version.

We collaborated with Relative Motion which is a specialist virtual reality content creation company. They used a 360 camera called an InstaPro to film the performance and collaborated with Northern Audio Productions on capturing spatial sound with a combination of ambisonic and single instrument microphones. We made a short feature about the process in Episode 5 of the first series of Up Close podcast, which you can listen to on this site from Friday 23 April.

You will hear these wonderful pieces through the speakers of your tablet, phone or computer, but we highly recommend you use headphones: without them you won’t get a true sense of standing in the middle of these extraordinary musicians, or hear the subtle changes in sound as you change your view.

You’ll be able to view the material on YouTube with most internet data speeds without stalling or buffering, but the faster your connection, the higher the quality of the video.

Some 360 video can have this effect, but you should not experience nausea with this experience. The camera (known as SAM, the Single Audience Member) was not moved during the filming with Ensemble 360 and therefore the viewpoint and movement that some people find uncomfortable when watching 360 content is not included. If you are viewing these experiences via a headset, we recommend you sit on an office chair that allows you to turn through 360 degrees while remaining in one place.