GERSHWIN & THE GREAT AMERICAN SONGBOOK

Lizzie Ball & James Pearson

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Saturday 11 January 2025, 2.00pm

Tickets:
£22
£14 UC, PIP & DLA
£5 Students & Under 35s 

Past Event
Violinist Lizzie Ball
Home› What's on› GERSHWIN & THE GREAT AMERICAN SONGBOOK

PIAZZOLLA Escualo (6’)
LAYTON (arr Andrew Cottee) After You’ve Gone (5’)
GERSHWIN (arr. Pearson) The Man I Love (5’)
KREISLER Praeludium and Allegro (6’)
GERSHWIN (arr. Heifetz) ‘Bess, You is my Woman Now’ from Porgy and Bess (10’)
GERSHWIN (arr. Pearson) Gershwin Finale Medley (6’)
COPLAND (arr. Pearson) El Salón México (10’)
PONCE (arr. Heifetz) Estrellita (5’)
KREISLER (arr. Rachmaninov) Liebesleid (4’)
Selections from the Great American Songbook (13’)
BERNSTEIN (arr. Pearson) West Side Story Suite (15’) 

Programme subject to minor changes 

Violinist Lizzie Ball has performed around the world with stars including Nigel Kennedy, Ariana Grande and Hugh Jackman. She returns to her native Sheffield with pianist James Pearson for an afternoon of timeless music for violin and piano. Join them for a journey through the musical and personal encounters of some of the finest composers of the Great American Songbook and beyond.

This concert features Gershwin, Copland, Bernstein and more, with arrangements of some of the best known showtunes from musicals, including ‘West Side Story’ and ‘Porgy and Bess’, together with some of the most enduring songs of the early 20th century. It promises to be an uplifting afternoon of memorable tunes interspersed with conversation.  

Save 20% when you book for 10 or more Music in the Round concerts in one transaction.
Save 10% when you book for 5 or more Music in the Round concerts in one transaction. Find out more.  

Browse the full programme online, explore the seasons with our digital brochure or download a copy of our 2025 brochure.

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About the Artists

Violinist Lizzie Ball

Lizzie Ball

Born in Sheffield, raised in rural Derbyshire, and based in London, Lizzie is a violinist, vocalist, concert producer and founder of Classical Kicks Productions. A prolific performer, Lizzie has been on the international stage for two decades. Lizzie was awarded an Honorary Masters from The University of Derby in 2018 in recognition of her innovative, creative approach to classical music. Shortly after this Lizzie was chosen as one of the UK’s most inspirational females in a list of 50 outstanding UK women making an impact, in a feature run by Daily Mail. Read more.

James Pearson

James Pearson is a pianist, composer and creative tour de force. James is the Artistic Director at Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club where his trio are the house band. As one of the country’s most respected musicians, James’ work covers all genres of music, especially contempory music, jazz, and classical. Equally at home as a concert pianist, he has broadcast on all the major radio and television networks, and played concertos with the Philharmonia and the BBC Concert Orchestra, amongst many others. His performance of Rachmaninoff’s 2nd piano Concerto was broadcast on Classic FM and Gershwin’s Piano Concerto and Rhapsody in Blue on BBC Radio 2. Read more.

THE RITE OF SPRING

Tim Horton & Ivana Gavrić

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Friday 10 January 2025, 7.00pm

Tickets:
£22
£14 UC, PIP & DLA
£5 Students & Under 35s

Past Event
Pianists Tim Horton and Ivana Gavric
Home› What's on› THE RITE OF SPRING

SHOSTAKOVICH Concertino in A minor for two pianos (10’) 
RACHMANINOV Suite No.1 for two pianos (24’) 
STRAVINSKY (arr. Stravinsky) The Rite of Spring (34’)  

The Romantic lyricism of Rachmaninov’s Suite No.1 for two pianos and Shostakovich’s Concertino featuring rousing Soviet-era dance tunes open this all-Russian evening of music for two pianos. These sit alongside Stravinsky’s riotous masterpiece The Rite of Spring, all performed by two of the UK’s leading concert pianists, Tim Horton and Ivana Gavrić.

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Save 10% when you book for 5 or more Music in the Round concerts in one transaction. Find out more.  

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SHOSTAKOVICH Dmitri, Concertino in A minor for two pianos, Op. 94

Shostakovich composed this miniature single-movement work for two pianos in 1954, just after completing his Tenth Symphony. It was written for his son Maxim, then a teenager studying the piano at the Moscow Conservatory. He gave the first performance with another student, Alla Maloletkova, on 8 November 1954; soon afterwards Shostakovich father-and-son made the first recording. It opens with a slow introduction in which stern, austere octaves contrast with a chorale-like idea, before launching into a sardonic Allegretto. Slow and fast sections alternate until a final dash to the close. Though some of the material is of a serious nature, much of the Concertino is quite playful, as befits a work originally conceived for young players. For Shostakovich, it must have come as a welcome relief after the Tenth Symphony, one of his most concentrated and fiercely argued masterpieces.

 

Nigel Simeone

RACHMANINOV Sergei, Suite No.1 in G minor, Op. 5

Barcarolle: Allegretto 
La nuit…l’amour [The night, the love]: Adagio sostenuto 
Les larmes [Tears] Largo di molto 
Pâques [Easter]: Allegro maestoso 
Subtitled ‘Fantaisie-Tableaux’, Rachmaninov composed his Suite No. 1 for two pianos in 1893. He gave the first performance with Pavel Pabst in Moscow on 30 November 1893. This was an occasion tinged with sadness: Rachmaninov dedicated the Suite to Tchaikovsky, who was planning to attend, but he died a few weeks earlier (and even before the premiere of the Suite, Rachmaninov started work on his tragic Trio élégiaque Op. 9 written in memory of Tchaikovsky). The Suite consists of four movements each of which was inspired by poetry. The ‘Barcarolle’ evokes a melancholy gondolier’s song, based on a poem by Lermontov in which ‘the gondola glides through the water, and time glides over surges of love.’ The second movement, ‘The Night…the love’ was inspired by Byron and depicts a passionate night-time tryst (‘It is the hour when lovers’ vows seem sweet in every whisper’d word’), accompanied by the song of a nightingale. In ‘Tears’, Rachmaninov took a poem by Fyodor Tyutchev about an endless cascade of weeping, evoked in the music by a series of falling phrases. The last movement, ‘Easter’, takes lines by Alexei Khomyakov as its starting point: ‘Across the earth a might bell is ringing … exulting in that holy victory.’ For this, Rachmaninov produced a magnificent evocation of Orthodox church bells – large and small – chiming at different speeds, and he also incorporated the chant ‘Christ is risen’.
Nigel Simeone

STRAVINSKY Igor, The Rite of Spring (arr. Stravinsky for piano four hands)

Stravinsky composed part of his elemental masterpiece, The Rite of Spring, on his family estate in the Ukraine, but the work was completed in the Swiss village of Clarens, overlooking Lake Geneva, with spectacular views of Mont Blanc and of the Swiss Alps down the Rhone Valley. Coincidentally, Clarens was also where Tchaikovsky had composed his Violin Concerto forty years earlier. The famous premiere, on 29 May 1913, took place at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées in Paris. The riot that ensued was largely the result of engineering by Serge Diaghilev, an impresario who learned early on that all publicity was good publicity for his Ballets Russes. By inviting a large group of students to sit alongside the regular subscribers, and by putting The Rite of Spring at the end of the first half of the programme – straight after the Chopin ballet Les Sylphides – the work had maximum shock value. Stravinsky was furious that his score couldn’t be heard, but delighted when its first concert performance in Paris a year later was greeted with such enthusiasm that he was carried through the streets afterwards. A few weeks before the first night, Stravinsky had played through the work in his piano four-hands arrangement with Debussy, and it was in this form that the work first appeared in print. It is a work that has never lost its power to astonish – and in this four-hand arrangement it loses nothing of its rhythmic daring and what Messiaen called its “magic power”.

 

Nigel Simeone © 2012

About the Artists

Tim Horton

Tim Horton is one of the UK’s leading pianists, equally at home in solo and chamber repertoire. He has appeared as soloist with major orchestras including the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, Birmingham Contemporary Music Group and Trondheim Symphony Orchestra.

Tim gave his debut solo recital at Wigmore Hall in 2016, and appears there frequently as both soloist and collaborative artist. He is regularly invited to play at distinguished festivals and series across the UK and abroad, including Music in the Round for whom he has presented a number of solo piano cycles, alongside his work with Ensemble 360.  During 2026 Tim presents the fifth and sixth instalments of his Chopin Cycle at London’s Wigmore Hall and embarks on a new Beethoven cycle for Music in the Round at the Crucible. Alongside his solo work Tim maintains a busy performing schedule with Ensemble 360 and the Leonore Piano Trio, and is a founding member of both groups. He is regularly broadcast by BBC Radio 3. Read more. 

Pianist Ivana Gavrić

Ivana Gavrić

Ivana Gavrić’s playing has been described as “altogether of an extraordinary calibre” (BBC Music Magazine) and “notable for its beautiful sound, musical integrity and introspection” (The Independent). She has attracted considerable praise for her interpretations of a broad repertoire, the Washington Post describing her playing as “impressive, insightful…ravishing”.

Ivana is drawn to composers like Janáček, Grieg and Chopin, who each take features of their respective homelands to create a distinctive musical voice, whether from the landscape and nature or from elements of folk music and dance. A long-standing collaboration with the award-winning composer, Cheryl Frances-Hoad has led to solo works and more recently a concerto entitled Between the Skies, the River and the Hills written for Ivana. Ivana is also committed to performing works by female composers of the past, particularly Cécile Chaminade and Dora Pejačević. Read more.

SHEFFIELD JAZZ

Tommy Smith & Gwilym Simcock

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Saturday 4 January 2025, 7.30pm

Tickets*
£19
Over 60, Disabled & Unemployed £17
Students with NUS card £10
15–17 -year-olds £5 
Under 15s free  

*Sheffield Jazz tickets do not qualify for any other Music in the Round ticket offers or discounts.

Past Event
Saxophonist Tommy Smith and pianist Gwilym Simcock
Home› What's on› SHEFFIELD JAZZ

Tommy Smith tenor saxophone
Gwilym Simcock piano 

Internationally acclaimed saxophonist Tommy Smith and Gwilym Simcock, renowned as one of the most gifted pianists on the European scene, come together for an acoustic night of intensely musical duets and dazzling improvisation. Both are multi-award winners who have played with the cream of international jazz artists, including Gary Burton, John Scofield and Pat Metheny. This is a meeting of two highly creative musicians, communicating with energy and lyrical fluency through a repertoire drawn from many musical genres. Expect an evening of intimate musical brilliance as they bring two generations of UK jazz mastery to the stage in world-class performances.   

“One of the important voices in the tenor players of today” Jack DeJohnette 

“Gwilym is one of the most exceptional musicians that I have ever known…he’s a really significant force in music” Pat Metheny 

Browse the full programme online, explore the seasons with our digital brochure or download a copy of our 2025 brochure.

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About the Artists

Gwilym Simcock

Gwilym Simcock has carved out a career as one of the most gifted pianists and imaginative composers on the European scene.  He moves effortlessly between jazz and classical music, with a ‘harmonic sophistication and subtle dovetailing of musical traditions’. Gwilym has been hailed as a pianist of ‘exceptional’, ‘brilliant’ and ‘dazzling’ ability, and his music has been widely acclaimed as ‘engaging, exciting, often unexpected, melodically enthralling, complex yet hugely accessible’, and above all ‘wonderfully optimistic’.

Gwilym’s influences are wide ranging, from jazz legends including Keith Jarrett, Chick Corea, Jaco Pastorius and Pat Metheny, to classical composers including Maurice Ravel, Henri Dutilleux, Béla Bartók and Mark-Anthony Turnage. Although principally a jazz artist, Gwilym has composed numerous works for larger Classical ensemble that combine through-composed elements with improvisation, creating a sound that is distinctive and very much his own. Read more

SOUNDS OF NOW: GRITSTONE TURNTABLES (DOUBLE BILL)

Leafcutter John & Graham Dunning

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Saturday 30 November 2024, 8.00pm
Tickets:
£17
£10 PIP / UC / DLA
£5 Students & Under 35s
Past Event
Leafcutter John's gritstone turntables
Home› What's on› SOUNDS OF NOW: GRITSTONE TURNTABLES (DOUBLE BILL)

Sheffield-based electronic musician Leafcutter John performs his new project GRIT in this double-bill concert with experimental turntablist Graham Dunning.

Responding to his love of the Peak District and climbing, GRIT sees Leafcutter John use his home-made quad turntable to conjure reeling melody and rhythm from the very texture of gritstone.

Graham Dunning’s work also explores sound as texture, timbre and something tactile. Drawing on bedroom production, tinkering and recycling found objects, Graham works with a DJ turntable as the engine of a ramshackle mechanical music system. He builds extensions and interfaces to sequence patterns, trigger synths, strike percussion and generate textures in this extraordinary, techno-infused performance, which is in turns abstract, clattering, cosmic and polyrhythmic.

Graham Dunning, turntable artist

Please note the Sounds of Now: Meltwater event originally scheduled for this date has been postponed until autumn 2025. More details to follow.

“Alongside Aphex Twin and Bogdan Raczynski, [Leafcutter John] is one of the UK’s most fearlessly inventive electronicists.”

Time Out London

About the Artists

Leafcutter John

Leafcutter John is the recording name of John Burton, a UK-based musician and artist.

Leafcutter John first found recognition twenty years ago through Mike Paradinas’s Planet Mu record label – a gold standard for the experimental fringes of electronic music.

Like many labelmates on Planet Mu, John’s music is completely unique to him. He blends analog synthesisers, unedited field recordings, processed sounds and audio textures borrowed from folk music – holding it all together with instruments he builds himself.

He makes frequent use of Max/MSP in his compositions. Much of Burton’s style is based in computer music and use of samples of everyday sounds. However, he also has roots as a folk musician, and this influence is apparent in his more recent work. Find out more. 

Graham Dunning, turntable artist

Graham Dunning

Graham Dunning is self-taught as an artist and musician. His live work explores sound as texture, timbre and something tactile, drawing on bedroom production, tinkering and recycling found objects. He also creates visual work, video and installations drawing on these themes.

Much of the work evolves through experimentation with different processes: considering the methods by which sounds become music; process as a continuum encompassing both improvisational and procedural methods; and testing analogous processes across different media.

Graham has performed solo and in ensembles across the UK, Europe and Canada, and exhibited in the UK, Europe, New Zealand and USA. He teaches Experimental Sound Art at the Mary Ward Centre in London and also gives various independent workshops. He has released through Entr’acte, Seagrave, Tombed Visions and more. Find out more.

SCHOOLS’ CONCERTS: GIDDY GOAT

Ensemble 360 & Lucy Drever

Crucible Theatre, Sheffield
16-18 October 2024, 10.45am / 1.30pm

To secure your place, please email
lucy@musicintheround.co.uk
with your preferred concert date and time
and the number of tickets you require

Giddy Goat family concert image
Home› What's on› SCHOOLS’ CONCERTS: GIDDY GOAT

Music in the Round invites your class to take part in a brilliant music project, culminating in a live concert at the Crucible Theatre this October.

Paul Rissmann (composer) has created a fantastic piece of music based around the children’s book Giddy Goat (Jamie Rix and Lynne Chapman) which includes songs for your class to learn and join in with in the concert.

Our EY and KS1 practitioners will support you to embed singing and music-making in classroom learning throughout the project, with training, resources, and in-school support newly developed around the Giddy Goat story. The project introduces young children to classical music in a fun and educational setting, including a concert featuring strings, woodwind and horn, presented together with story-telling and projected illustrations.

Being a mountain goat is no fun when you are scared of heights! Stand poor Giddy on a mountain ledge and his head starts spinning and his knees turn to jelly. But can he find the fearless goat inside himself in time to rescue little Edmund?

Performed by the wonderfully dynamic and hugely engaging musicians from Ensemble 360, this concert is a great introduction to live music for early years and KS1 children. It’s full of wit, invention, songs and actions, and plenty of opportunities to join in. 

Current availability for tickets (each concert is 55 mins):

Weds 16 Oct, 10.45am (aimed at FS1&2) low availability

Weds 16 Oct, 1.30pm (aimed at Y1&2) good availability

Thur 17 Oct, 10.45am (aimed at Y1&2) very low availability

Thur 17 Oct, 1.30pm (aimed at FS1&2) good availability

Fri 18 Oct, 1.30pm (aimed at Y1&2) low availability

These schools concerts are supported with an in-person training session at the Crucible Theatre on Thursday 12 September. Choose from 9.30am-11.30am, 1.00pm-3.00pm or  4.00pm-6.00pm (low availability for the twilight session).

Download our educators’ info pack for further information.

Download

 

About the Artists

Ensemble 360 musicians

Ensemble 360

Ensemble 360 has gained an enviable reputation across the UK for the quality and integrity of their performances. Formed in 2005, eleven musicians of international standing came together to take up residency in South Yorkshire with Music in the Round, establishing a versatile group comprising five string players, five wind players and a pianist.  Get a glimpse of them in performance here.

The Ensemble 360 musicians share a passion for the music which radiates through each performance. Their enthusiasm, drive and musicality captivate audiences both through the quality of their playing and their engaging spoken introductions. Due to the flexible nature of the group’s line-up the repertoire possibilities are enormous; anything from baroque duos, through classical quartets to new commissions for all eleven players. 

 

Lucy Drever

Lucy Drever is a presenter, workshop leader and narrator. She regularly presents and leads workshops with some of the leading orchestras, arts venues and music charities in the UK including the Philharmonia Orchestra, Wigmore Hall and the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra of which she is Associate Artist. She has recently narrated concerts for Lambert Jackson at the London Palladium and is the Head of Creative Learning at the Benedetti Foundation. Furthermore, she was recently appointed trustee of the Samuel Gardner Memorial Trust.

Lucy works in a variety of settings including arts venues, schools, Early Years spaces, hospitals, conservatoires and prisons. As well as education consultancy she works across various industries, helping people with their presenting and public speaking skills.

Read more.

CLASSICAL SHEFFIELD AT THE WINTER GARDEN

Winter Garden, Sheffield
Saturday 18 May 2024, 11.00am
Free event
Home› What's on› CLASSICAL SHEFFIELD AT THE WINTER GARDEN

Join Classical Sheffield for pop-up performances in the Winter Garden.

11am – Sonority Upper voice chamber choir

11.45am – Matt Leese Amateur composer performing ‘Melodic Moments’

12.30pm – Black Velvet Clarinet Quartet

1.15pm – Sinsontes Singing group singing songs of love and longing from Cuba and Spain

2pm – Singing In… Community choirs performance

2.45pm Hailu Ni Soprano vocalist

SYMPOSIUM Making the Case for Classical: Research, Insight and Advocacy

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Wednesday 22 May 2024, 10.30am

£50 / £25

Association of British Orchestras non-member academic delegate / non-member student delegate

 

Past Event
Home› What's on› SYMPOSIUM Making the Case for Classical: Research, Insight and Advocacy

In this challenging period of arts funding, it’s more important than ever that we have the right evidence to make the case for classical music. This one-day symposium will explore the current state of research and data in the classical music sector and help to improve the quality and effectiveness of the evidence we collect.

This symposium will be of interest to:

DORE OPEN GARDEN: MUSIC & MEMORIES

Sheffield
Sunday 16 June 2024, 2.00pm

Tickets by donation.
Please book in advance.

Past Event
Home› What's on› DORE OPEN GARDEN: MUSIC & MEMORIES

Join us for a summer afternoon (2pm till 5pm) in one of the beautiful gardens of Dore.

Discover a beautifully planted Dore garden in full bloom, accompanied by live music. Explore local artwork and sculptures displayed within the borders, with signage that reflects a family’s memories and amusing stories.

With a raffle and light refreshments, come and spend some time in a gorgeous garden, donating as you feel able to support Music in the Round.

Live music will be provided throughout the afternoon by our own Bridge Ensemble and Sheffield musicians, including Steel City 5 and Endcliffe Flute Trio.

Please note the Eventbrite booking site will ask you to make a donation (minimum £1) when you book your tickets. Please enter the donation amount for your whole party – the next screen will ask you how many people are coming. You will then be issued with a single ticket for the whole group.

Further information:

– Advance booking strongly recommended, as space is limited

– Please note there will not be access to toilet facilities at this event

– On street parking is available on Heather Lea Avenue and the surrounding streets, but please be considerate of our host’s neighbours and park carefully

– No dogs please (except guide dogs)

THE MONSTER IN THE MAZE

Music-Makers of Sheffield

Crucible Theatre, Sheffield
Saturday 2 November 2024, 11.00am / 3.00pm

Tickets 
£5 for everyone  
Carers free 

Past Event
Silhouette of a Minotaur head
Home› What's on› THE MONSTER IN THE MAZE

DOVE The Monster in the Maze (50’)

An opera production for the people of Sheffield and with the people of Sheffield.

Music: Jonathan Dove
Libretto: Alasdair Middleton
Music Director: John Lyon
Director: Rosie Kat
Theseus: Anthony Flaum
Mother: Camille Maalawy
Daedalus: Robert Gildon
King Minos: Paul Hawkyard

Featuring ENSEMBLE 360, CONSONE QUARTET, BRIDGE ENSEMBLE, SHEFFIELD MUSIC HUB SENIOR STRINGS, SHEFFIELD YOUTH CHOIRS featuring JUNIOR VOICES, YOUTH VOICES & CONCORDIA and SINGERS FROM SHEFFIELD

“Here they are – the children of Athens!
The hope of Athens, the future of Athens!
Deep in the maze, the monster, already
paws the sand and tosses his horns…”

      - libretto, Monster in the Maze

King Minos has a labyrinth in his palace. Inside there lurks a Minotaur. This monster, half man and half bull, feeds on human flesh.  

Minos decrees that the Athenians should provide a regular supply of their young people to be sacrificed to the monster. The Athenian hero Theseus steps in, determined to enter the maze and take on the monster at its heart…

Jonathan Dove’s ‘The Monster in the Maze’ receives its Sheffield premiere on the iconic Crucible stage. Our most ambitious project to date, this will be Music in the Round at its best: a bold collaboration, forged in the crucible of creativity that is our City of Makers. 

Commissioned and first performed in 2015 by the Berlin Philharmonic and London Symphony Orchestra with Simon Rattle, it was praised by the Financial Times as “an exhilarating, visceral take on the ancient Greek myth”.  

This amazing new production will showcase people of all ages coming together from across the city to perform alongside our professional resident artists and guests, highlighting the best of music-making in Sheffield. 

An epic story: millennia in the making and a fitting celebration for our 40th anniversary year! 

With thanks to our funders: Blakemore Foundation, JG Graves Charitable Trust, Music for All, Scops Arts Trust Sheffield Music Hub, Sheffield Mutual and individual donors.

View the brochure online here or download it below.

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About the Artists

Theseus: Anthony Flaum

Anthony is a graduate of the Royal Academy of Music & the National Opera Studio. He has sung principal roles with many of the UK’s major opera companies – English National Opera, Scottish Opera, Grange Park Opera, Buxton Opera Festival, Northern Ireland Opera, Iford Arts, Nevill Holt Opera and Opera Della Luna amongst others. He began his career in the original Olivier award-winning production of La bohème as Rodolfo for OperaUpClose. In 2021, he made his acting debut to much critical acclaim in King Lear alongside Sir John Tomlinson & Sir Thomas Allen at The Grange Festival and The Soldier’s Tale at Edinburgh International Festival with Sir Thomas Allen. He is very active on the private function market, passionate about educational outreach in the arts and has sung with many celebrated orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic. He recently founded his own opera theatre company Prologue Opera in his hometown of Hastings. He continues to broaden his work as a Producer with other music companies in the region and also in other genres…for example by recently playing Hillaire Belloc in Cautionary Tales – a new musical play (dir. Keith Warner). Most recently, he sang Cavaradossi in Becoming Tosca (Prologue Opera).

Mother: Camille Maalawy

Camille has achieved notable acclaim for bridging both musical and cultural divides. Born to a Coptic Egyptian father and English mother, her repertoire is as extensive as it is diverse, specialising in singing new music and often working directly with composers to incorporate elements of Arabic music.

Camille made her debut at Glyndebourne last autumn, playing Oma in Glass Human by Samantha Fernando. Recent highlights include ‘Weather Forecaster’ in The Water Diviner’s Tale for Opera North; presenting a group of newly written songs at Hull Jazz Festival as a Kickstart Commission Artist, and the premiere of Egyptian composer, Nahla Mattar’s Songs on Colloquial Arabic at the Royal Opera House Engender Festival. In addition, Camille completed a PRSF Resonance residency with Opera North, where she explored the diversity of her cultural heritage more deeply, co-creating a new song cycle, Mezzaterra (Meeting Point), which has been performed at Opera North and as part of the Tete-a-Tete festival.

Daedalus: Robert Gildon

Robert studied singing at Manhattan School of Music, New York, the Tanglewood Music Center, Aspen Music Festival (performing lead role in John Casken’s Golem) and the Britten Pears School. He was a recipient of the Garsington Opera Prize.

Work includes Orlando Gough’s Weather the Storm (Garsington Opera), Billy Budd in Billy Budd REimagined (ROH), Old Man in The Moon Hares (Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenmen), Scott Stroman’s new opera ‘The Weekend’, based on Michael Palin’s play, (Bloomsbury Theatre), Old Man in world premiere of The Old Man and the Sea (First Light Festival/Britten Pears Arts), Don Giovanni (Garsington Opera Lord Mayor/Education Project), Lord Cecil in Philip Cashian’s The Cumnor Affair (Tête à Tête), Compere in The Answer to Everything (Streetwise Opera/BFI), Head Fox in children’s opera Outfoxed at the Royal Festival Hall, Journalist in Jonathan Dove’s TV opera Man on the Moon (Channel 4) and Dave Brubeck’s cantata La fiesta e la posada (London Symphony Orchestra /Barbican).

King Minos: Paul Hawkyard

Paul has worked in an extensive range of acting roles from TV drama, Children’s TV, and West End Musicals and shows. Credits include Ghost Stories, War Horse, Old Jack’s Boat, The Railway Children and Emmerdale.

ROMANTIC PIANO TRIOS

Leonore Piano Trio

Crucible Playhouse, Sheffield
Tuesday 8 October 2024, 7.00pm

Tickets
£22
£14 UC, DLA & PIP
£5 Under 35s & Students 

Past Event
Leonore Piano Trio featuring violinist Benjamin Nabarro, pianist Tim Horton and cellist Gemma Rosefield
Home› What's on› ROMANTIC PIANO TRIOS

HAYDN Piano Trio No.44 in E Hob. XV:28 (18’)
BEETHOVEN Piano Trio Op.1 No.2 (33’)
R SCHUMANN Piano Trio No.1 Op.63 (31’) 

The beguiling Leonore Piano Trio continues to trace this most intimate form of music, the piano trio, from its origins in works by Haydn, through the stately trios of Ludwig van Beethoven and onwards to the great Romantic masters.  

This time, Robert Schumann’s celebrated Trio No.1 takes centre stage. From its restless, tumultuous opening full of brooding intensity, to its majestic, triumphant conclusion, this is an epic work full of romance and humanity.  

View the brochure online here or download it below.

DOWNLOAD

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HAYDN Joseph, Piano trio in E Hob XV:28

Piano sonatas with accompaniments for violin and cello were a popular style of domestic music in the late eighteenth century and were the origin of the form that soon started to be called the piano trio. Haydn’s status as one of the great musical innovators is unassailable: to be known as the ‘Father of…’ both the symphony and the string quartet – and to be a composer of genius – gives him a unique place in the history of music; but the same could be said of his development of the piano trio. The present example is one of a set of three first published in London in 1797 and written for the pianist Therese Jansen. She was a pupil of Clementi, and Haydn was a witness at her wedding to the art dealer Gaetano Bartolozzi. Much admired by musicians, Jansen had little or no public career despite her gifts – a typical state of affairs for female pianists at the time. On the evidence of the virtuoso piano writing in the E major Piano Trio, she must have been an exceptional player. Haydn creates some extraordinary musical effects right from the start: the opening theme is presented by the piano, shadowed by pizzicato strings, over a staccato bass line. After this ethereal start, there’s a complete contrast in the rapid piano figuration that follows.  In the development section, the opening theme is transformed into a kind of chorale, in the remote key of A flat major. The expressive range of this movement is remarkable, as is the striking change of mood for the Allegretto that follows. Written in E minor, it opens with a theme in continuous quavers playing by all three instruments in octaves, and this idea then becomes the bass line for the whole movement. Different ideas are heard over the top of it, and unlike a Baroque ground bass, Haydn’s snaking line evolves and modulates. The finale is just as unpredictable. The opening theme sounds straightforward enough, but Haydn stretches out its second phrase in an unpredictable way. And while a section in E minor is conventional enough for a finale in E major, the brief excursion into E flat minor must have caused consternation at the time. So, too, must the passages near the close where the music pauses on highly chromatic chords before finally heading to an affirmative close.  

Nigel Simeone © 2015 

BEETHOVEN Ludwig van, Piano trio Op.1 No.2

The second of Beethoven’s Op.1 piano trios was first performed along with the other two in the set (in E flat major and C minor) at a private concert in Vienna at the house of Prince Karl von Lichnowsky, to whom the whole set of was dedicated, before they were published by Artaria in 1795. Applauded by Haydn at the private performance, Beethoven’s new trios attracted a starry list of subscribers including Count Appony (who first suggested to Beethoven that he should write a string quartet) Countess Anna Maria Erdödy (dedicatee of the two piano trios Op.70 and the cello sonatas Op.102), Prince Lobkowitz (dedicatee of both the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies), Count Rasumovsky (the Russian Ambassador in Vienna and dedicatee of the three String Quartets Op.59) and Prince Lichnowsky, to whom Beethoven dedicated his Op.1 and in whose home the pieces had first been played.  

The G major Trio is the only one of the set to begin with a slow introduction – an expansive Adagio in which Beethoven gives a foretaste of the main theme of the Allegro vivace, which begins in a state of harmonic uncertainty that is clarified only gradually (the first unambiguous G major tonic chord is not heard until the sixteenth bar of the Allegro). The slow movement, in the remote key of E major, was likened to a passionate love song by Romain Rolland, while the Scherzo is fast but relatively subdued, an ideal prelude to the exciting finale in which the music is driven by incessant repeated semiquavers for much of the movement.  

Nigel Simeone © 2015 

SCHUMANN Robert, Piano trio in D minor Op.63

Schumann spent much of the summer of 1847 at work on his D minor Piano Trio – the work was sketched in June and the movement were completed in August and September. It was probably written as a response to the Trio that his wife Clara had composed the previous year. The first private performance was given on 13 September with Clara at the piano – it was her birthday, and just six days after Schumann had finished the finale. In the first movement (marked ‘with energy and passion’) the music alternates between the volatile minor-key opening and a more serene theme in the major. A remarkable and innovative feature of this movement is Schumann’s writing for the instruments: during a wonderfully evocative passage in the central development section the strings are instructed to play on the bridge (‘sul ponticello’) while the piano uses the una corda (left-hand) pedal. The effect is extraordinary. For all its apparent straightforward high spirits, the second movement – a Scherzo – gave Schumann a lot of trouble, especially the central Trio section where the three instruments play a rising and falling scale-like theme in imitation. The slow movement is back in a minor key, and is marked ‘with intimate expression’. Its opening theme (on the violin) unfolds hesitantly at first, but this initial idea grows into a long, sinuous melody. As in the famous Piano Quintet (written in 1842), the finale of the Trio includes a transformation of the theme that opened the first movement, but now the mood is exultant and untroubled.  

Nigel Simeone © 2010 

About the Artists

Leonore Piano Trio

Formed in 2012, the Leonore Piano Trio brings together three internationally acclaimed artists whose piano trio performances as part of Ensemble 360 were met with such enthusiastic response that they decided to form a piano trio in its own right. The Trio has since given concerts both at home and in many other parts of the world, combining a comprehensive repertoire of works by the celebrated classical and romantic composers; an unrivalled exploration of lesser-known and forgotten pieces from the 19th century; exciting and innovative performances for young audiences and a range of contemporary and new works.

Find out more. 

JESS GILLAM & FRIENDS

Jess Gillam Ensemble

Crucible Theatre, Sheffield
Thursday 17 October 2024, 7.15pm

Tickets
£22
£14 UC, DLA & PIP
£5 Under 35s & Students 

Past Event
Jess Gillam, classical saxophone player
Home› What's on› JESS GILLAM & FRIENDS

Jess Gillam shot to fame as the first saxophonist to reach the finals of BBC Young Musician and the youngest ever soloist to perform at the Last Night of the Proms. Her infectious enthusiasm and passion for music lights up every stage.  

Her newly-formed Jess Gillam Ensemble brings together brilliant musicians who share her bold, uplifting and open-minded approach. Including music from Jess’s chart-topping albums and featuring music from Bach to Björk and Boulanger to Bowie, this promises to be an electrifying concert showcasing the versatility of the saxophone. 

MILHAUD (arr. John Harle) Scaramouche ‘Brazileira’ (3’)
CPE BACH  (arr. Simon Parkin) Allegro Assai fromFlute Concerto in A minor  (10’)
BJÖRK (arr. John Metcalfe) Venus as a Boy (4’)
N BOULANGER (arr. Alastair Vennart) Cantique (3’)
DAVID BOWIE (arr. Alastair Vennart) Life on Mars (4’)
MARCELLO Oboe Concerto in D minor (10’)
– interval –
BARBARA THOMPSON A Tribute to Sidney Bechet (4′)
AYANNA WITTER-JOHNSON Lumina (4’)
BARBARA STROZZI (arr. Alastair Vennart) Che si puo fare (4′)
RUNE SORENSEN (arr. Simon Parkin & Jess Gillam Ensemble) Shine You No More (4’)
JS BACH Adagio Ma Non Tanto from Sonata No.3 in E minor BMV1016 (5’)
JOHN HARLE Briggflatts (21’)

View the brochure online here or download it below.

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“A true inspiration…she frankly rocks”

Huffington Post

“Not just one of Britain’s most virtuosic instrumentalists, but also an unstuffy, inspiring personality”

The Times

MENDELSSOHN STRING QUARTETS

Consone Quartet

St Matthews Carver Street, Sheffield
Saturday 26 October 2024, 2.00pm

Tickets 
£17
£10 UC, DLA & PIP
£5 Under 35s & Students 

Past Event
Players from the Consone String Quartet with their instruments
Home› What's on› MENDELSSOHN STRING QUARTETS

 FELIX MENDELSSOHN
   String Quartet in E flat (1823) (27’)
   Scherzo from Four Pieces Op.81 (3’)
   String Quartet in E minor Op.44 No.2 (30’) 

Music in the Round’s new Visiting String Quartet made their spellbinding Sheffield debut with a rapturously received celebration of the quartets of Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn in spring 2024.  

They return to Sheffield this autumn for an immersive afternoon and evening exploring more of Felix Mendelssohn’s quartets. 

View the brochure online here or download it below.

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MENDELSSOHN Felix, String Quartet in E Flat (1823)

Mendelssohn was fourteen years old when he composed his E flat major String Quartet in 1823 – two years before Beethoven completed the first of his ‘late’ quartets, and two years before Mendelssohn himself wrote the first version of his Octet. It was published posthumously (in 1879) but is much less well-known than Mendelssohn’s mature quartets. Prodigiously gifted though he was, Mendelssohn was still finding his way stylistically so this work owes much to the models of Haydn and Mozart and, in the finale, to Bach. The Mendelssohn authority R. Larry Todd wrote that the music of the composer’s earliest attempt at writing a full-length string quartet was ‘firmly grounded in the classical tradition’ – but Todd also noted that it was completed in just eleven days: the first page of the autograph manuscript is dated 25 March 1823 and the last page 5 April. The opening Allegro moderato is an elegant, rather Mozartian movement in sonata form, but the Adagio non troppo, in C minor, is darker, with more adventurous chromatic harmony. The Minuet and Trio has distinct echoes of Haydn while the finale is a contrapuntal tour de force: a double fugue which was probably modelled on the fugal finales in three of Haydn’s Op. 20 quartets. 

Nigel Simeone © 2024 

MENDELSSOHN Felix, Scherzo (from Four Pieces for String Quartet), Op. 81, No. 2

The four pieces for string quartet published in 1850 as Mendelssohn’s Op. 81 were assembled from music written over a twenty-year period: the earliest dates from 1827 while the Scherzo was composed in 1847, the year of Mendelssohn’s death. The gossamer lightness of his scherzos was already apparent in the early Octet, and perhaps the most celebrated example was composed in 1842 for the incidental music to A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Marked Allegro leggiero, the same inspired lightness of touch and dazzling flair for the most delicate instrumental writing are both apparent in this late example of a stand-alone Scherzo for string quartet. 

Nigel Simeone © 2024 

 

MENDELSSOHN Felix, String Quartet in E minor Op.44, No.2

Mendelssohn composed a set of three string quartets first published in 1840 and dedicated to Gustav, Prince of Vasa, Crown Prince of Sweden. The first version of Op.44 No.2 was completed in 1837 and first performed that year, and before publication Mendelssohn revised it two years later. This work shows the most comprehensive command of the medium of the string quartet – demanding but superbly crafted, and beautifully written for the instruments involved. The first movement is dominated by a kind of lyrical melodiousness that hints at the musical language of a more famous work by Mendelssohn in the same key: the Violin Concerto. Where his earlier string quartets were intended as a deliberate homage to Beethoven – reflecting that in their terse, concentrated ideas – in this quartet Mendelssohn is more overtly expressive, while still controlling the form with great concision and skill. The Scherzo in E major is in the dashing, elfin style familiar from the Octet and the incidental music for A Midsummer Night’s Dream and it’s easy to forget just how utterly original Mendelssohn was being in these movements. The slow movement, in G major, is a relaxed song without words, leading to a finale of great intensity and ingenuity in which a consistent level of energetic flow is complemented by a brilliant variety in texture.
© Nigel Simeone

About the Artists

Consone Quartet

The first period instrument string quartet to be selected as BBC New Generation Artists, the Consone Quartet are fast making a name for themselves with their honest and expressive interpretations of classical and romantic repertoire. Music in the Round is delighted to welcome the Quartet to ‘the family’ as our Visiting Quartet. Supported by the Frost Trust, they visit schools across the city, working in partnership with Sheffield Music Hub and performing at concerts promoted by us around the country.

Formed at the Royal College of Music in London, the Consone Quartet launched their professional career in 2015, shortly after which they were awarded two prizes at the 2015 York Early Music International Young Artists Competition, including the EUBO Development Trust Prize and a place on the EEEmerging Scheme in France. They went on to win the 2016 Royal Over-Seas League Ensemble Prize, and in 2022 were awarded a prestigious Borletti-Buitoni Trust (BBT) fellowship. Read their full biography here.