Music for now, for later, for ever…
Tue 21 Feb 2012
It was the morning of Friday 27 January 2012. There was much clapping, chatter and the hum of excited voices from the group of Year 6 children eagerly joining in with the ‘warm up’. I was sitting at the back of the concert hall, at Kings Place, waiting for my first experience of Anthem for…
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Berlioz’s Romeo & Juliet: Programmes
Mon 20 Feb 2012
At Saturday’s performance of Berlioz’s Romeo & Juliet we were slightly victims of our own success. A huge surge in bookings in the last week meant we had a much larger audience than we had bargained for. This is of course wonderful, and it was fantastic to see such a packed hall, but it did…
Read MorePatricia Bardon steps in for Sonia Ganassi
Thu 16 Feb 2012
Due to ill-health Sonia Ganassi has unfortunately had to withdraw from forthcoming performances of Romeo & Juliet. However we are very pleased that Patricia Bardon has agreed to step in at very short notice, having previously performed the role at the Edinburgh Festival in 2010. Patricia’s biography is below: Patricia Bardon’s current season includes Erda…
Read MoreHector & Harriet: love, tragedy and the Bard
Tue 14 Feb 2012
It’s Valentine’s day (well it was when I wrote this….). It can be a rather grim, over-commercialised affair, but in an attempt to redress the balance, I thought it would be worth taking a look at the romantic trials and tribulations of Hector Berlioz, one of the nineteenth century’s great composers. He was a man…
Read More2012-2013 London concerts: now on sale
Tue 14 Feb 2012
Our 2012-2013 Southbank Centre season is now on public sale. It all starts off on 30 September when Emeritus Conductor Sir Roger Norrington returns to us to conduct a programme of Haydn, Cherubini, Gluck, Berlioz and Bizet that not only starts our season but also our 5-event series celebrating strong female roles in opera, Queens,…
Read MoreAnthem Spring workshops
Mon 13 Feb 2012
So we’ve been busy in the Education Department. In preparation for the Anthem for a Child school concert tour, each participating primary school receives a workshop from two OAE players – no mean feat when there are over 60 primary schools involved over 9 different locations in the UK. I’ve been routed at HQ (the…
Read MoreFebruary Podcast: Sir Mark Elder, Laurence Cummings and frothy tea…
Thu 9 Feb 2012
It’s time for the latest packed edition of the OAE podcast, this time with added snazzy intro music. In this edition we speak to Sir Mark Elder about Berlioz’s Romeo and Juliet, chat with Laurence Cummings about Bach, talk to composer Sally Beamish and writer Melanie Reid about Spinal Chords, a new piece for the…
Read MoreSally Beamish and Melanie Reid talk about ‘Spinal Chords’
Thu 9 Feb 2012
Tomorrow night we bring Sally Beamish’s new piece, Spinal Chords, to London for its premiere in the Capital (above: in rehearsal). Its world premiere in Southampton on Sunday got a great reaction from the audience and the press, with The Times giving it 4 stars and commenting: “Spinal Chords does not so much express as…
Read MoreSally Beamish: Speed interview
Tue 7 Feb 2012
This Friday, we’re very excited to be premiering a brand new commission by award winning composer Sally Beamish as part of PRS for Music Foundation’s New Music 20×12. Spinal Chords is a piece of music set to a text written by Melanie Reid, a columnist on The Times who broke her neck and back following…
Read MoreSpinal Chords in rehearsal
Fri 3 Feb 2012
Giving a world premiere of a new work is, understandably, a rareity for the OAE. It’s not totally unknown however, and we have performed new pieces by Mark Anthony Turnage, Jonathan Dove and Heiner Goebbels in the past. Indeed the Goebbels has become something of a signature piece for us and the London Sinfonietta, with…
Read MoreThe OAE: Proud to support local businesses…
Thu 2 Feb 2012
Compiling and editing programmes is a thankless task. No matter how many times you proof read it, no matter how many people do it, there will always be mistakes in it. And while it’s pretty rare for someone to come up to us and say ‘I love your programmes’ (though it has happened), errors in…
Read MoreThe Glory of Venice: Audience Reaction
Mon 30 Jan 2012
A few weeks ago we kicked off 2012 at the Southbank Centre with The Glory of Venice – a celebration of the music of Gabrieli. If you’re near Bristol there’s another chance to hear this concert at St George’s, on 19 February.
Read MoreBeethoven 9 CD: “Euphoric”
Fri 27 Jan 2012
Our recently released CD of Beethoven 9, conducted by Sir Charles Mackerras, has already been awarded 5 stars by the Financial Times, but we’ve just come across another rather flattering review for it, this time in BBC Music Magazine: “The sleeve-note of this disc describes Beethoven’s ninth symphony as ‘euphoric’, and that is exactly the…
Read More2012-2013 Season – sneak preview
Wed 25 Jan 2012
As you may have read in a previous post, this Monday we launched our 2012-2013 Southbank Centre season to the press at the Royal Festival Hall. So it’s now time to give you some highlights and tell you what’s in store. Public booking for the season opens on 14 Feb, but you can book NOW…
Read MoreBryn, croissants and ladykillers: Launching the new season
Tue 24 Jan 2012
Yesterday morning much of the classical music press, together with famous musical names and a legion of Orchestra CEO’s and other behind-the-scenes staff gathered in the glamorously named ‘Level 5 Function Room’ at the Royal Festival Hall for the launch of the 2012-2013 concert season. As our regular attenders will know, the Southbank Centre is…
Read MoreRecent reviews: The Glory of Venice
Wed 18 Jan 2012
Friday 13 January wasn’t an unlucky day for the OAE, as we had some great audience feedback following our concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall with Robert Howarth directing a programme celebrating the music of Giovanni Gabrieli on the 400th anniversary of his death.
Read MoreHighpoints to Torpoint!
Tue 17 Jan 2012
It’s now the middle of January and a team of us from the OAE have already worked with 16 primary schools from Plymouth to London on our Anthem for a Child project. Top quotes so far include: ‘That was fantastic, I love singing, I sing everyday!’ Pupil from High Street Primary ‘What an amazing day!…
Read MoreStar in our new brochure – final call for entries!
Mon 16 Jan 2012
As you may have seen, for our upcoming marketing campaign for our 2012-2013 season of concerts we’re putting audience members centre stage. We’re looking for people with an unusual or strong ‘look’ to star alongside OAE musicians in the ‘oae and me’ photographs for the season, and we’re now in the final few days of…
Read MoreA thousand twangling instruments…the first Anthem workshops
Mon 9 Jan 2012
Not wanting to waste any time in OAE Education, we have already had the first sessions of the year with Anthem workshops in Plymouth and London this week. For the first few months of 2012 OAE players will go into schools and start to teach the Anthem songs ‘Twangling Instruments’ and ‘My Cry’. OAE Education…
Read MoreFancy starring in our next marketing campaign?
Fri 6 Jan 2012
Followers of the OAE will know that we like to have a distinct ‘look’ to the marketing of each of our seasons, with every year’s campaign starring the people that make the OAE special – the musicians. For our 2012-2013 season campaign though we want to try something a little different. We want our audience…
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