Available Events

BYRD'S LULLABY - CONSORT SONGS OF LOVE, DEATH & SLEEP

The consort song, which originated in the theatre songs of the late 16th century, was a uniquely English genre, setting sacred and secular poetry to the accompaniment of a consort of viols. Perhaps because of its dramatic roots, it was associated particularly with texts of invocation, memorial, and lullaby.

Newe Vialles was launched in 2015 by co-directors Henrik Persson and Caroline Ritchie, its members are some of the finest period instrumentalists of their generation. Along with Helen Charlston (winner of the 2018 Handel Singing Competition, Mesmerising – Jonathan Freeman-Attwood, The Gramaphone), they present a programme of profound and intimate consort songs from the late Elizabethan era: from William Byrd’s great laments for Sir Philip Sidney and Thomas Tallis, to anonymous gems by forgotten composers, encompassing lullabies, invocations to the muses, and moralistic tales, the programme exploring the gamut of Elizabethan musical and poetic expression. The songs are complemented by instrumental music from the golden age of the English viol consort, by Thomas Tomkins, Orlando Gibbons, and Henry Purcell.

Saturday 12th October 2019 - 7.30pm
Tickets: £21.00 / £18.50 / £16.00
Early Bird 20% Discounted Season Ticket if ALL 5 concerts booked by 12th October 2019

Every discounted ticket must be matched by a further discounted ticket from each of the other four events

Thomas Guthrie - baritone
Daniel Grimwood - fortepiano
Winterreise, Op. 89, D. 911
Franz Schubert

A performance with a difference. Thomas Guthrie is an innovative and award-winning British director and musician working in theatre and music to tell stories in vivid, new and direct ways. This extraordinary interpretation combines his expertise as a singer, (chilling and thrilling, The Sunday Times), with that of Mandarava’s puppet, which he manipulates himself throughout the performance, (“amazing…extraordinary…wonderful…absolutely compelling” (Sean Rafferty, BBC Radio 3, In Tune). Guthrie is joined by fortepianist, Danel Grimwood, a performer of international renown, combining an exceptional talent, rare versatility and refinement, with an inquisitive personality.  (“Probably the finest all‐round musician I have ever known” – Felix Aprahamian).

Saturday 16th November 2019 - Reception: 7pm / Concert: 8pm
Tickets: £23.00 / £21.00 / £17.00
Early Bird 20% Discounted Season Ticket if ALL 5 concerts booked by 12th October 2019

Every discounted ticket must be matched by a further discounted ticket from each of the other four events
 

Elin Manahan Thomas - soprano
Elizabeth Kenny - lute & theorbo

NOW WINTER COMES SLOWLY

To warm your hearts during Advent, this is a programme which welcomes festivities with delicious music from all around Europe. From Handel’s merry arias to Bach’s more contemplative hymns, we bring you a collection of seasonal and celebratory songs.

Elin Manahan Thomas is one of the most exceptional sopranos of her generation. Since releasing her début album “Eternal Light in 2007, with the OAE, she has performed at many of the world’s most prestigious venues and festivals, and with leading orchestras and conductors. (Ravishing simplicity, The Times). She is joined by Elizabeth Kenny, one of Europe’s leading lute players. Equally at home in solo, chamber music and the opera house, she combines a love of the lute repertoire with a flair for imaginative collaborations that enrich an unusually varied performing life. (Indecently beautiful, Toronto Post – Radical, The Guardian).

Saturday 14th December 2019 - 7pm
Tickets: £21.00 / £18.50 / £16.00
Early Bird 20% Discounted Season Ticket if ALL 5 concerts booked by 12th October 2019

Every discounted ticket must be matched by a further discounted ticket from each of the other four events

Nicolette Moonen - baroque violin
Pawel Siwczak - chamber organ
Reader to be announced

The Sorrowful Mysteries from The Rosary Sonatas
Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber
Organ Music by Buxtehude & Pachelbel
Contemporary Poems for The Passion

Continuing the theme of our 2019 Lent Concert with reflective words and music, SSEMK presents an evening exploring the unique sounds of the second of Biber’s triptych. Often evoking a mood of profound contemplation, the six sonatas follow each other through the gospel story of Good Friday. Each will be interspersed with organ music of Buxtehude and Pachelbel and contemporaneous poems. Nicolette Moonen is well known to SSEMK audiences as the artistic director of The Bach Players who were Artists-in-Residence for the first four years of SSEMK’s existence. She is joined by Pawel Siwczak, winner of the 8th Broadwood Harpsichord Competition, who now spends a busy career as a continuo player and conducting from the keyboard, collaborating with, amongst others, Florilegium, The Bach Players, the OAE and the Gabrieli Consort & Players.

Saturday 4th April 2020 - Reception: 6.30pm / Concert: 7.30pm
Tickets: £21.00 / £18.50 / £16.00
Early Bird 20% Discounted Season Ticket if ALL 5 concerts booked by 12th October 2019

Every discounted ticket must be matched by a further discounted ticket from each of the other four events

Stephen Preston - baroque flute
Harpsichordist - to be announced

The Flute Sonatas and A minor Partita of Johann Sebastian Bach

Of unfailingly remarkable quality, all these works exploit the full potential of an instrument which was only just coming into its own when they were written as it superseded the recorder. Stephen Preston taught himself to play the baroque and classical flute as a modern flute student at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, going on to be a founder of many of London's leading period-instrument ensembles in the 1970s and forming The Galliard Trio with Trevor Pinnock and Anthony Pleeth. Following twenty years as a choreographer, he has returned to performing, teaching, (at all the major UK conservatories), and research into birdsong for which he was awarded a Ph.D. He has recorded the complete Flute Sonatas with Trevor Pinnock.

Saturday 16th May 2020 - 7.30pm
Tickets: £23.00 / £21.00 / £17.00
Early Bird 20% Discounted Season Ticket if ALL 5 concerts booked by 12th October 2019

Every discounted ticket must be matched by a further discounted ticket from each of the other four events