The Barbican today announces its 2017-18 classical music season featuring Britten Sinfonia as Associate Ensemble.
Britten Sinfonia celebrates its 25th anniversary with a Barbican season that features symphonic masterpieces, choral gems, contemporary classics and jazz-inspired rhapsodies. It will be the second year of a three-year Beethoven Symphony Cycle conducted by Thomas Adès, featuring Beethoven’s 4th, 5th and 6th Symphonies, juxtaposed with music by Gerald Barry (22 & 24 May 2018).
In November Sir Mark Elder returns to conduct the orchestra in an intimate performance of Brahms’s First Symphony. To accompany the symphony, Elder has chosen poetic works including Mahler’s Rückert-Lieder, with soloist Elisabeth Kulman, and Finzi’s soaring Fall of the Leaf .
Christmas and Easter are marked by choral masterworks. The Choir of King’s College Cambridge joins Britten Sinfonia for a performance of Bernstein’s Chichester Psalms, and Vaughan Williams’ impassioned Dona nobis pacem. Stephen Cleobury conducts the orchestra and the programme also includes the world premiere of a new work by Emma-Ruth Richards. Easter is marked by Britten Sinfonia Voices in a performance of two masses written 170 years apart: Stravinsky’s Mass and Mozart’s Missa Brevis.
Mercurial American pianist Jeremy Denk will be the 2017-18 Milton Court Artist in Residence. As part of his residency, directs a programme of jazz-inspired works by Stravinsky and Gershwin in February 2018.
Britten Sinfonia’s season kicks off with a performance at Milton Court as part of the Barbican and LSO celebration of Sir Simon Rattle’s inaugural season, This is Rattle. Focusing on British music form the last 50 years Britten Sinfonia feature in a concert curated by Helen Grime that includes music by Purcell, Britten, Helen Grime, Oliver Knussen, George Benjamin and Colin Matthews.
Booking opens on the following dates:
Members Plus: 10am Wednesday 25 January
Members: 10am Friday 27 January
General public: 10am Friday 3 February
Telephone and in person: 10am Wed 22 February
For full details of Britten Sinfonia’s 2017-18 season at the Barbican click here
