16 to 25 June 2023
Founded by counter-tenor Alfred Deller in 1962 and now under the artistic direction of I Fagiolini’s Robert Hollingworth, Stour Music Festival occurs each year in late June; ten concerts take place in the large Pilgrim church of All Saints’ Boughton Aluph, Kent.
Stour Music 2023 starts with a bang, literally the devil ‘shooting up in the air like a rocket!’, as I Fagiolini and Brecon Baroque bring an animated cast of characters to life in foot-tapping music from 17th and 18th century Italy, Germany, England and Spain – not just Bach and Monteverdi but Neapolitan pantomime with castanets and percussion. Bach’s St Matthew Passion (for double choir and orchestra) is performed by Bach specialists Solomon’s Knot, while on the first Sunday we hear three Bachs (and more) in intriguing revoicings by debutants Corvus Consort and Ferio Saxophone Quartet.
Week two starts with a special Stour commission – a rare gathering of a 22-player Renaissance Wind Band in an hommage to pioneer David Munrow – one of the most inspiring early musicians of his generation. Bach triple harpsichord concertos played by three masters -Trevor Pinnock, Terence Charlston and Steven Devine – provide another hommage, this time to harpsichord maker and Stour lynchpin Andrew Garrett who died in 2021, while our final celebration takes us to 17th-century Rome with a Mass for four choirs by Orazio Benevoli.
Our atmospheric candlelit evenings bring us the dynamic young Spanish voices of Cantoría, Fair Oriana, Helen Charlston’s dark chocolate mezzo-soprano – and an innovation: late night vocal jazz in the marquee.
Booking opens 11 April 2023
Website: http://www.stourmusic.org.uk
Box Office: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/stour-music
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