Chelsea (Arts) Festival

So the Chelsea Festival has been re-born as the Chelsea Arts Festival, with the same administrator and festival director but apparently without the support of the Cadogan Estate. The programme looks moderately similar to Stewart Collins' previous Chelsea Festivals. In terms of classical music the programme is a little disappointing. The higher profile events seem to be concerts which could also be seen else-where. The opening concert of the festival is a concert featuring Rick Wakeman and the closing concert is Willard White giving his Paul Robson concert.

Tasmin Little's The Naked Violin, a mixture of concert, demonstration and audience interaction in which Little aims to help people listen to the violin.

Another instalment of Alec Roth and Vikram Seth's collaboration, this one is called Seven Elements, performers include James Gilchrist, Philippe Honore and Rustem Hayroudinoff. This is a co-commission with the Salisbury and Lichfield Festivals - probably the only way a small festival like Chelsea could afford such a high profile commission.

Herve Desarbre is giving an organ recital at Holy Trinity, Sloane Street, but including works by composers such as Nino Rota and Shostakovich.

The State Apartments in the Royal Hospital are the venue for concerts by soprano Laura Mitchell, by Young-Choon Park and by the Brodowski Quartet. The Brodowski's Quartet's programme includes Haydn's Opus 20 and Mendelssohn's Opus 80. Pianist Young-Choon Park is performing music by Haydn, Schubert, Scarlatti, Beethoven and Mendelssohn. The apartments are also being used for an Australian music showcase featuring 3 young Australians - Amir Farid (piano), Jacob Cordova (guitar), Duncan Rock (baritone)