A strong shortlist - the Royal Philharmonic Society Awards

The short-list for the 2017 Royal Philharmonic Society Awards was announced earlier this week, Presented in association with BBC Radio 3, the award represent major recognition of achievement in classical music. The shortlist is amazingly diverse and it is good to see that non-London events and organisations are prevalent with Birmingham Opera, East Neuk Festival, Leeds Lieder (director Joseph Middleton who is also shortlisted in his own right), Cheltenham Music Festival, Lammermuir Festival, Welsh National Opera, Manchester Camerata, Ulster Orchestra (recently threatened with closure), Age UK Oxfordshire, South-West Open Youth Orchestra (the UK's only disabled-led orchestra),

It is good to see that Garsington Opera's terrific production of Mozart's Idomeneo (see my review) is in the Opera and Music Theatre category, along with the Opera North Ring Cycle and the Royal Opera's production of Philip Venables' 4.48 Psychosis (which is coming back in Covent Garden's 2017/18 season).

Young artists are also heavily featured. As well as the Young Artists category which includes Mirga Grazinyte-Tyla (in the Conductor category too), Andrew Gourlay, Joseph Middleton and Heloise Werner, Allan Clayton is in the Singer category along with Christine Rice and Karita Mattila, whilst the Southbank Sinfonia is  in the Orchestra category, and Mark Simpson is in the Chamber Scale Composition category.

The winners will be announced at a ceremony on 9 May 2017, and the trophies will be presented by Stephen Hough.

Full details of the shortlist from the RPS Music Awards website.