Brighton Early Music Festival 2022

 

My highlights from this year's Brighton Early Music Festival: 

Exceptional music making from such a talented pool of #BREMFLive musicians @brightonemf @flutesandfretsduo @tufnelltrio @horizon.voices #BREMFMedievalEnsemble @liturinamusic #earlymusic #bremf https://t.co/3CYKPCX43C

— Nick Boston 🏳️‍🌈 (@nickb86uk) October 22, 2022

 

Flutes & Frets

Tufnell Trio

 

BREMF Medieval Ensemble

Liturina

Horizon Voices

 

Spiritato & The Marian Consort

 

Exhilarating, energetic, life-affirming playing and singing from @spiritato & @marianconsort in 'Inspiring Bach' @brightonemf #BREMF #earlymusic @ St Martin's Church, Brighton https://t.co/DRUbGWgoUF

— Nick Boston 🏳️‍🌈 (@nickb86uk) October 22, 2022

 

Ensemble Molière, Angela Hicks & Kieran White

Glorious #rameau & stately #lully in 'Les Lullistes contre les Ramoneurs', beautifully played by @ensemblemoliere with enchanting and virtuosic singing from @AngelaHicksSop & @KWhiteTenor - a fine conclusion to @BREMF #BREMF #earlymusic pic.twitter.com/2nLyD0yhdL

— Nick Boston 🏳️‍🌈 (@nickb86uk) October 23, 2022

Brighton Early Music Festival - ‘BREMF@home – across the Earth’

For obvious reasons, there will sadly be no live concerts to attend in this year’s Brighton Early Music Festival. However, undeterred, BREMF are presenting a series of events online instead. Events will be premiered at a fixed date and time on YouTube and will remain online for a week. Although the events will be freely available, BREMF are requesting that viewers make a donation in place of buying concert tickets in the normal way via their website. This is crucial, as most of their regular funders have diverted funds to emergency aid during the COVID-19 crisis. 

Events run from Friday 23 October to Sunday 1 November. 

Spiritato!

Pocket Sinfonia will perform classics by Mendelssohn and Beethoven, adapted for chamber proportions, with animation and film of the natural world. Meanwhile, Spiritato! take the music of Heinrich Biber, and use puppets made from recycled materials to present Birds, Bugs and other Beasts – a Musical Menagerie. 

Piers Adams (credit: Emma Bailey)

A fifteenth-century barn and the pastoral Sussex landscape are the setting for Ensemble Augelletti’s Arcadian Wilderness, with music by Handel, Corelli, Geminiani and others, whilst James Duncan from Sussex Wildlife Trust is joined by Piers Adams on recorders for Bird Charmer, a talk with music on the song birds of Sussex. 

Joglaresa (credit: Andrew Mason)

Father and son Dirk and Adam Campbell play new and traditional music on a variety of instruments from Africa and Asia in Connections, while Joglaresa introduce us to medieval songs of protest in Rebellion!, including songs challenging corrupt leaders, religion and even sexual norms. Continuing the Sussex theme, Musicke in the Ayre will perform Sweet Ayres of Arcadia, set in the house and gardens of St Mary’s House, Bramber, in the Sussex Downs. 

Despite not being able to audition new ensembles for their prestigious BREMF Live! scheme this year, previous ensembles will be showcased with past and new footage of their musical activities. 

And as ever, the festival will end with a celebration – The Four Faces of Gaia. Four regions of the earth (Africa, India, the Middle East and Europe) and the four elements (Earth, Air, Fire and Water) combine in a celebration through traditional and early music and dance. 

For more information, dates and times, and details of how to donate, go to bremf.org.uk.

Brighton Early Music Festival 2016 - Preview

BREMF enters its fifteenth year and this year’s programme is as eclectic and diverse as ever.  As well as over fifteen events in the main festival (28 October – 13 November), there are also nine pre-festival events, including workshops, masterclasses, talks, tasters, and even a concert specifically targeted at 2-5 year olds. So as well as hearing great performances from top class early music musicians, you can take part too.

This year’s theme is Nature and Science, and events look the interconnections between these, and how they run closely with the history of music.  So the festival looks at the lives of some well-known and lesser-known scientists, musicians, philosophers and thinkers, as well as exploring the influence of science and nature on music and composers in new and imaginative ways.

The Marian Consort

Co-director Clare Norburn has written another music drama, following on the success of previous projects about the lives of Gesualdo, Hildegard of Bingen and others, this time turning her attention to Galileo.  As well as being a famous astronomer, physicist & philosopher, he had a passion for music, and music played a huge part in his family life, as well as in his understanding of practical experiments.  Music is performed by The Marian Consort and the Monteverdi String Band.

English Cornett & Sackbut Ensemble
(credit: Hugh Beauchamp)

And Co-director Deborah Roberts presents an ambitious new production, Gaia, combining music and drama from the 16^th and 17^th centuries with 21^st century effects including film, projections, lighting, mime, yoga and dance to tell the story of our Earth.  The music includes Brumel’s amazing ‘Earthquake’ Mass, and performers include the English Cornett and Sackbut Ensemble, the BREMF Consort of Voices, the Lacock Scholars and the BREMF Community Choir – an event not to be missed!  Money is still being raised to support this ambitious venture – and until 13^th September you can support it too.  See more here and at www.crowdfunder.co.uk/gaia-appeal.

The Telling
(© Robert Piwko)

Other events include L’Avventura London exploring the little-known 17^th century musician, alchemist & polymath Athanasius Kirchner, the viol consort Fretwork performing Bach’s The Art of Fugue, and The Telling perform The Lily and the Rose, a programme of music from the 12^th to 15^th centuries inspired by these flowers, and their association with the Virgin Mary.  For ‘Fairest Isle and Foulest Weather’, a programme of music from The Tempest by Matthew Locke and King Arthur by Henry Purcell, the BREMF Players and BREMF Singers are directed by John Hancorn.  

Palisander

Spiritato! present ‘Guts and Glory!’, with heroic music for strings, five natural trumpets and drums, baroque brass at its dazzling best.  And in a brand new family show, the recorder consort Palisander, a hit at last year’s festival, combine with puppets from Rust and Stardust to present Dr Dee’s Daughter and the Philosopher’s Stone.

Details of all these concerts and more, as well as all the pre-festival events in September and October, can be found at www.bremf.org.uk or telephone 01273 709709.  Tickets on sale from 5 September.