Britten Pears Arts reveals Spring 2025 programme

Cultural charity Britten Pears Arts has announced the programme for its upcoming Spring 2025 season. The series of concerts and events will include 20^th birthday celebrations for Aurora Orchestra alongside a Bellini opera, family concerts and a Friday Lunchtime Concerts series.

Aurora Orchestra will celebrate its 20^th birthday at Britten Pears Arts’ Snape Maltings campus in early May, with a performance of Mahler’s Das Lied von der Erde featuring founder and principal conductor Nicholas Collon alongside mezzo-soprano Alice Coote and tenor Andrew Staples. The orchestra will also team up with ‘physical-theatre-makers’ Frantic Assembly for a reimagined performance of Carnival of the Animals paired with Richard Ayres’ new work Dr Frompou’s Anatomical Study of an Orchestra which invites the audience to consider what happens to the performers when the show is over. Saint-Saëns’ work will also be adapted for children, in Carnival of the Animals Early Years.

Britten Pears Arts chief executive Andrew Comben said: ‘Our Spring season sees the rising up of creativity mirror the awakening of nature as winter turns to spring. From the youngest participants at Mini Music Makers to some of the world’s finest performers, there is something for everyone. We are honoured that the incredible Aurora Orchestra have chosen to celebrate their 20th Anniversary with us given their long association with the organisation... The Red House opens in April with an intriguing new exhibition about our founder Benjamin Britten and his spiritual life, while exciting younger-generation musicians continue the much-loved Friday Lunchtime Concerts series. The programme also offers insights into the process and preparation which leads to performance, with Open Sessions sharing in-the-moment creativity from residency artists and our own Aldeburgh Young Musicians. We hope you will join us.’

Snape Maltings will also welcome the return of English Touring Opera in 2025 for a performance of  Bellini’s reworking of Romeo & Juliet, The Capulets & The Montagues. Britten Pears Arts will celebrate Easter with performances of Bach Cantatas by the Britten Pears Chamber Choir, the Suffolk Ensemble and alumni of the Britten Pears Young Artist Programme including include alto Alexandra Meier, tenor Thomas Herford and bass Francis Brett. Performances at Blythburgh Church and St Mary’s Church, Bury St Edmunds will be conducted by Ben Parry.

Participants in the Britten Pears Young Artist Programme (BPYAP) will also perform at Friday Lunchtime Concerts every Friday from late January to mid-April at Aldeburgh Jubilee Hall, Snape Maltings and Orford Church. Performances will feature young ensembles in the 2024-25 Britten Pears Young Artist Programme as part of their residencies in Snape and Aldeburgh.

Artist development is also the motivation behind a series of Open Sessions offering audiences a chance to experience works-in-progress created during Britten Pears Arts Residencies. As well as The Laboratory of Lullabies featuring mother-and-daughter duo Naomi Burrell (violinist and composer) and Margareta Burrell (composer), the series will also feature a collaboration between traditional Scottish instrumentalist Brìghde Chaimbeul and composer Martin Green. Theremin, waterphone, and voice combineHannah Catherine Jones’s work in progress, while choreographer and composer Dickson Mbi celebrates courageous women in his new piece.

At the Red House, Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears' home in Aldeburgh, curator Paul Edmondson explores the spiritual aspects of Britten’s life and music in new exhibition Spiritual Britten which opens on 3 April.