A moving combination of music and words that evoke the North, curated by leading chamber musicians, combining poignant Grieg, British folksongs, and a major new song cycle from award-winning composer Gavin Higgins.

A moving combination of music and words that evoke the North, curated by leading chamber musicians, bringing together poignant Grieg, British folksongs, and a major new song cycle from award-winning composer Gavin Higgins.

This wonderfully evocative recital calls to mind icy Nordic landscapes and dark forests but also a less tangible sense of “the North”, of lonely moors, ancient rocks and starry darkness. At its heart is our new commission from composer Gavin Higgins, Speak of the North: “a song cycle about place, landscape, borderlands, and belonging. Set to poems by a range of Northern poets such as the Brontë sisters, Michael Symmons Roberts, Zoe Mitchell, Tony Williams, Katrina Porteous, and Katie Hale, the cycle looks at what it means to be Northern. With songs about the Peak District, Manchester as seen from above, coal-mining landscapes, an argument between Hadrian’s wall and the Sycamore Gap tree, and some Northumbrian folksongs, Speak of the North is a sprawling journey through both the physical and imagined landscape of Northern England.”

This concert is also an homage to the musical world of Edvard Grieg, especially his violin sonatas and the song cycle Haugtussa (The Mountain Maid). The latter is a moving setting of eight poems by the Norwegian writer Arne Garborg that speak of dreams, love and forlorn sadness by a babbling brook. His second violin sonata, written during his honeymoon, is inflected with Norwegian folksongs and, zestfully sunny, it cannot help but dance.

The programme is completed by folksong settings by Percy Grainger, who, like his hero Grieg, instinctively understood the true spirit of folk music. We are delighted to present the first performance of this compelling recital by three leading chamber musicians as part of the Festival’s exploration of the North.

Claire Booth soprano
Christopher Glynn piano
Tamsin Waley-Cohen violin