2020 Festival Guide
In the light of Government recommendations it is with deep regret and sorrow that the Festival Board took the decision to cancel the 2020 Newbury Spring Festival which was due to take place in May. The decision was made not only to ensure the safety of our audience, artists and members of staff but also due to the inability of our international artists to travel and venues being closed on Government advice.
We still hope it might be possible to stage a “Mini-Season” in the Autumn, subject to our ability to do so and national guidelines. As a Festival we have always been committed to music for the young and we very much hope to re-open our schools education programme when we can. Please keep an eye on our website for updates on our future plans.
We’re as disappointed as you must be that we’re not going to be able to present this year’s Festival programme. So, we’ve put together a selection of videos from this year’s fantastic artists that you can watch and listen to in the comfort of your own home over the coming weeks. It may not be the programme as planned, but we hope it’ll give you a flavour of some of the spectacular work being produced by Newbury Spring Festival’s most recent selection of artists and performers.
Here you can read Mark’s introduction he’d prepared for the 2020 Festival:
To celebrate Beethoven’s 250th anniversary, the Festival will open with an all Beethoven programme from BBC Symphony Orchestra under their chief conductor Sakari Oramo with Paul Lewis , one of Britain’s finest pianists. The next day we have more world class Beethoven with John Lill’s afternoon performance of some of the most popular piano sonatas, and a week later, this year’s Sheepdrove Piano Competition has Beethoven as its featured composer. Sir Nicholas Kenyon will be our guide to changing Beethoven performance styles in his talk at Shaw House on 19th May and two days later we will welcome members of Wiener Kammersymphonie to perform arrangements of Beethoven’s orchestral music for string quintet. Beethoven string quartets are included in Consone Quartet’s Young Artists Recital and Behn Quartet’s performance, A Taste of Germany at The Vineyard.
Paul Lewis
Nearer to our own times we mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day in Churchill biographer Andrew Roberts’ talk at Englefield House.
This year we visit two new venues, St John’s Newbury where renowned oboist Nicholas Daniel is joined by members of the Britten Oboe Quartet, and Church of The Ascension Burghclere for the Vienna Chamber Symphony string quintet concert. We will return to Englefield for a 20th anniversary concert by 4 Girls 4 Harps, to St Mary’s Shaw with Northern Chords Ensemble, to Kintbury with festival favourites the Kinsky Trio, and to Sheepdrove for Mikhail Kasakevich’s piano recital. For the first time we welcome Scottish Fiddlers RANT to Donnington Priory, and musical theatre star Liz Robertson to Andrew Lloyd Webber’s private theatre at Sydmonton.
The Sons of Pitches
Highlights of the Corn Exchange programme include popular vocal group The Sons of Pitches, Clare Teal and her trio, The Dominic Alldis Trio with their tribute to Jacques Loussier, IDMC Gospel Choir, leading steel band Solid Steel Ambassadors, Bollywood Brass Band with their tribute to R D Burman, Derek Paravacini with his new quartet, and satirical duo Bounder & Cad. Lux Musicae reveal The Hidden Origins of Flamenco, while in their lunchtime recital Ensemble Hesperi show the influence of Scottish folk music on native baroque composers. Graduating students from Ballet Central and Chichester University Musical Theatre Company return with new shows, and for our younger audiences we present The Adventures of Peter Rabbit by Waterperry Opera. Other young artists appearing in our lunchtime recital series include brilliant horn virtuoso Ben Goldscheider, prize-winning cellist Jonathan Swenson, and guitarists extraordinaire duo. On 13th May we are privileged to welcome for his festival debut Ukranian baritone Andrei Kymach, winner of the 2019 BBC Cardiff Singer of the World for an evening of Tchaikovsky Rachmaninov and Ukranian songs.
Other vocal and choral highlights include British star soprano Lucy Crowe, returning to Hungerford for an all Strauss recital, contralto Hilary Summers in her hilarious cabaret What’s So Great About Opera? at Combe Manor, The Carice Singers at East Woodhay with a musical celebration of Spring, the welcome return of amazing Solomon’s Knot to Ramsbury for an evening of Bach cantatas, Harry Christophers and The Sixteen returning to Douai Abbey in their 20th anniversary Choral Pilgrimage, and our own Festival Chorus teaming up with London Mozart Players for a performance of Mozart’s Vespers and Coronation Mass conducted by Stephen Barlow.
The Sixteen
St Nicolas Church, Newbury
Our last night at St Nicolas Church promises to be a very special occasion: the debut visit of St Petersburg Symphony Orchestra under Nikolai Alexeev, and one of the final performance by much loved violinist Tasmin Little before her early retirement from the concert platform, in a performance of a work which she and I have longed to bring to Newbury, the ravishing Korngold Violin Concerto.
Mark Eynon, Festival Director
Festival Focus
