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Enjoy some virtual music!

With classical music concerts being cancelled or postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak, musicians are taking to the internet to livestream concerts into your living room. Others have videos and YouTube links on their websites. Here’s a round-up of some of the performers with local links who are getting in on the act.

Craig Ogden and the London Mozart Players

Oxfordshire-based guitar virtuoso Craig Ogden launches the London Mozart Players’ Saturday Sessions series at 7pm on March 28th with a recital livestreamed from his home via the LMP’s Facebook page. Craig, who was due to perform in two concerts with the LMP this spring, will play a varied selection from the classical guitar repertoire, including Barrios’ Vals in G major Op.8 No.4, Scarlatti’s Sonata in E major and excerpts from Rodrigo’s Concierto de Aranjuez. 

Craig Ogden

The series is part of LMP’s new ‘At Home with LMP’ initiative, which was launched on Monday 23rd March and will feature daily musical treats. Tune in for Mozart Mondays, Chamber Tuesdays, Thursday Thoughts and Family Fridays, as well as other live and pre-recorded performances, behind-the-scenes clips and a look at LMP’s education work. 

Find out more at http://londonmozartplayers.com/athome/

Garsington Opera

Garsington Opera recently announced the cancellation of its 2020 season, which was set to include a revival of John Cox’s 2009 production of Fidelio to mark Beethoven’s 250th birthday as well as new productions of Verdi’s Un giorno di regno, Dvorak’s Rusalka and an early Mozart opera, Mitridate, re di Ponto

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But you can still enjoy one of the highlights of Garsington’s 2019 season – Smetana’s joyful The Bartered Bride, described as one of the company’s “most thrilling productions yet” and by Bachtrack as “a joyful experience from beginning to end”. Natalya Romaniw, as Marenka, was hailed in The Telegraph as “the outstanding British lyric soprano of her generation”. 

If you missed it last season, now is your chance to see it all for free. If you saw it at Wormsley – well, why not enjoy it all again? The opera is being streamed free until May. Catch it here: https://www.garsingtonopera.org/news/watch-bartered-bride-online

Also, from 27th March you can see Garsington Opera’s 2017 production of The Marriage of Figaro, which will be livestreamed by OperaVision as part of their Mozart Festival: https://operavision.eu/en/coming-soon 

Oxford Lieder Festival Young Artist Platform 2020

Oxford Lieder’s Spring Song was another recent cancellation, but the good news is that the main Festival in October is still set to go ahead and there are big plans for the 20th anniversary in 2021.

Meanwhile, you can take a peek at the festival’s Young Artist Platform from January, when six duos each performed a 45-minute recital to compete for two Young Artist awards. Open to post-graduate students at UK conservatoires, this event always showcases some extraordinary talent and is well worth a watch. 

This year’s adjudicators were tenor Daniel Norman and pianist Eugene Asti, and the two winning duos – Siân Dicker (soprano) and Krystal Tunnicliffe (piano), and Joël Terrin (baritone) and Cole Knutson (piano) – will now get the opportunity to perform in recitals at the Oxford Lieder Festival and around the country as Oxford Lieder’s ‘ambassadors of song’.

See all the action from January at www.oxfordlieder.co.uk/live. There is also further information about the winning duos on the website.

Jack Gibbons

One of Oxford’s most popular pianists, whose concert career started at the Holywell Music Room when he was just fifteen, Jack Gibbons had two concerts lined up for 7th and 14th April that have now sadly been cancelled. But, while crossing fingers that his annual summer series at the Holywell – incredibly, his 33rd this year – will still go ahead, whet your appetite by taking a look at his website, where you will find numerous links to YouTube clips of Jack playing music by Gershwin, Alkan, Chopin and Bach, as well as some of his own compositions. Take a look here: http://jackgibbons.com

The Sixteen

Finally, if you were looking forward to The Sixteen’s Choral Pilgrimage tour coming to Oxford in March, head over to the website to see the choir rehearsing under the baton of conductor/founder Harry Christophers. There are other audio and video clips, too, featuring interviews and fascinating glimpses behind the scenes. Enjoy them here: https://thesixteen.com/media/

The Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra

A more recent announcement comes from Oxford Philharmonic inviting you to join them for their virtual concert performance of Beethoven’s Symphony No. 1 on Monday 30 March at 8pm. This new date in the Oxford Philharmonic diary aims to continue bringing world-class performances to you so you can stay connected with the OPO and enjoy the Orchestra’s performances in the comfort of your home.

Link will appear on the OPO website at 8pm on Monday: https://oxfordphil.com

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