In our Good Music News round-ups we celebrate and share positive stories about music and music education.
Summer is here (I think!) and there are plenty of outdoor music events for music teachers and your students to enjoy.
Here are a few highlights:
- The Folk Forest is back in Sheffield
- The Big Youth Music Experience
- Sofia Gomez Alberto
- Buxton International Festival 2019
- Lesley Garrett
- Manchester International Festival 2019
- Oldham Summer Festival
Here in our home city of Sheffield the Folk Forest is on this weekend (6 and 7 July). Over 60 performers will take to five stages in a mellow woodland setting in Endcliffe Park. This event is always a delight. It also features heritage craft workshops (woodcarving, spinning and blacksmithing); an array of fine food and beer from local brewers. Mmm, tasty.
Adult tickets are £25 (one day only) or £35 for the weekend; child tickets are £15 for the weekend or £10 per day and under 5s go free. We’ve been to the Folk Forest many times in previous years and made lots of serendipitous musical discoveries. Once again this promises to be a super event. Full details and tickets are here.
The Big Youth Music Experience – on 13 and 14 July in Nottingham – is an exciting festival of music-making opportunities organised by Music for Everyone. It features workshops for instrumentalists and singers, performances, and festival fringe events including samba drumming, capoeira dancing, a “come and try it” steel band performance, the Nottingham Youth Jazz Orchestra, and many more. Looks like a super weekend. Here are the details.
This Saturday (6 July) at the Barbican in London the violinist Sofia Gomez Alberto, winner of the Junior Guildhall Lutine Prize 2018 will perform Saint-Saëns’ Violin Concerto No. 3 in B Minor within a programme which also includes Wagner and Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. Tickets available here.
Buxton International Festival 2019 takes place in venues throughout the lovely spa town including the Buxton Opera House. It’s on from 5–21 July 2019, and this is the 40th anniversary year of the Festival. There is an exciting concerts series, and there are operas, literary events, town walks and more.
Programme and full details are here, and watch this short clip:
Meanwhile this Friday (5 July) in Yorkshire the soprano Lesley Garrett is presenting a “unique evening of song, reminiscence and chat covering her thirty years in the classical music world.” It’s at the Wesley centre in Malton, full details and tickets are available via Eventbrite.
Manchester International Festival 2019, from 4th to 21st July, takes place in a “rich tapestry of venues” – from theatres, galleries and concert halls to railway depots, churches and car parks. Treats in store at this year’s festival include the world premiere of Philip Glass and Phelim McDermott’s Tao of Glass, and the world premiere of a new piece of music, an elegy for Peterloo called The Anvil, by composer Emily Howard and writer Michael Symmons Roberts, winner of the Costa Poetry Award. There are plenty of other performances and family events too and new work by artists including David Lynch. Here’s the programme on the MIF website.
I did some work in Oldham last year and like the sound of the free Oldham Summer Festival. It’s organised by the Oldham Music Centre, takes place on Saturday 6 July (10am—7pm) and includes over 40 performances from brass bands, guitarists, orchestras, rock bands and choirs.
The Summer Festival, which was held in the town centre for the first time last year, is an “exciting way of showcasing the talents of all Oldham Music Centre’s groups in a jam-packed family day out,” according to Oldham Council.
A programme and full details are here.
What next?
- Checkout our recent interview with highland bagpipe teacher, James Carnegie.
- Read earlier editions of Good Music News.
- If there’s something you would like us to cover in Good Music News, please email us.
- Here’s some good news for music teachers: our free 29 tips for a thriving music teaching business will give you things you can do immediately to boost your music teaching business. They’ll also make you smile.