Celebrating 30 years and 300 years

The Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music 2013 has just finished (see my review of the opening concert), and it has been confirmed that we can look forward to great celebrations in 2014. Next year will be the 30th anniversary of the festival, which was founded in 1984 by conductor Ivor Bolton and musicologist Tess Knighton. The 2014 festival will be celebrating other anniversaries too; the 300th anniversary of King George I's ascension to the British throne, reflecting a major period in German and British cultural history. Also the 300th anniversary of the birth of C.P.E. Bach as well as 300 years since the foundation stone of St. John's Smith Square was laid. St. John's has been the home of the festival since 1988 and was designed by Thomas Archer (1688 - 1743); it was one of a planned 50 new churches for London and Westminster funded by a tax on coal imports in 1711. The full festival programme will be announced in November 2013, further information from the festival website.