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FESTIVAL TO CELEBRATE RETURN TO LIVE MUSIC IN WARWICK AND LEAMINGTON
The Warwick & Leamington Midsummer Music Festival, running from 25 June to 10 July, will celebrate the resumption of live music-making in the two towns.
The Festival has twenty-four concerts, over half featuring local choirs, orchestras, chamber groups and soloists. Works that will have wide appeal include three symphonies, No 4 by Brahms, the ‘New World’ by Dvořák and the ‘Eroica’ by Beethoven.
The Leamington Music contribution features the Choir of Clare College Cambridge, Ex Cathedra, The Bach Players and the Coull Quartet as well as recent winners of the Leamington Music Prize. A highlight will be the concert on 9 July by Mark Padmore with guitarist Morgan Szymanski, a regular visitor to Leamington over the years. The previous evening, Armonico Consort’s performance of Bach’s St Matthew Passion, features an equally distinguished tenor, Ian Bostridge, singing beside the great bass, Sir Willard White.
The Festival which involves members of the Warwick District Music Promoters Forum came about as a result of Festival Director, Richard Phillips, putting up a proposal at a Forum Meeting in February.
Choir of Clare College Cambridge (© Nick Rutter)
He says, “I felt at that time there would be a good chance of concerts happening again by the end of June and, having noticed that there were a number of entries in the anti-clash diary which the Forum operates, decided to see what could be pulled together as well as adding some ideas I was working on for Leamington Music.
“Using churches in both towns and The Dream Factory in Warwick, plus three open air spaces, an exciting range of music will be on offer. Music from the sixteenth century is particularly well represented, but all centuries in between are well represented and there are concerts of American music for 4 July, with The Liberty Bell joined by Gershwin and Elvis Presley.”
The Festival will also mark the 25th anniversary of Music to Your Ears, the music guide produced by the Forum three times a year about concerts for Warwick, Leamington Spa and beyond. The leaflet has always shown that this area enjoys a rich provision of music-making, punching well above its weight on the regional music scene. The up-to-date version can be found on www.musictoyourears.org.uk.
Booking is opening now for all the concerts in the Midsummer Festival. Each promoter is handling its own event and the eleven Leamington Music concerts are bookable on www.leamingtonmusic.org, with the site also carrying details of all the Festival concerts. Lunchtime concerts in St Mary’s Church in Warwick and Holy Trinity Church in Leamington have free entrance and a retiring collection.
The full Warwick & Leamington Midsummer Music Festival leaflet is available to view online: https://issuu.com/leamingtonmusic/docs/midsummer_festival_leaflet_2021_web