17th International Malcolm Arnold Festival

This year's Malcolm Arnold Festival, the 17th, will be somewhat different. Previously, the festival has been based in Arnold's home town of Northampton, but this year the centre of operations moves to London and also to a wide audience on-line. The festival takes place in London on 8 and 9 October 2022, and then there will be an on-line day of performances on 30 October 2022.

Things begin on 8 October with a concert at the Church of St Barnabas in Ealing, when John Gibbons conducts the Ealing Symphony Orchestra in Arnold's Homage to the Queen, Divertimento No. 2 and Trumpet Concerto (with soloist Nick Budd), plus Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique. Then on 9 October there is a day of events at the Royal College of Music, with performances from the RCM String Ensemble, conductor Hilary Davan Wetton of works for string orchestra and chamber ensemble, including concertos and the Ukrainian Folk Variations, an illustrated lecture by Dominic Wheeler on Arnold's opera The Dancing Master, a masterclass from Julian Lloyd Webber, and a talk on Arnold's fellow student and friend Ruth Gipps. 

Then on 30 October there will be a day of free-to-view live-streamed performances coming from locations that were of importance to Arnold and inspired some of this music. The English Dances are performed by Northampton County Youth Orchestra, the Welsh Dances performed by members of the Royal Welsh Conservatoire, the Scottish Dances performed by The Orchestra of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Junior Department, and the Cornish Dances and Padstow Lifeboat performed by the St Dennis Band in Cornwall, including members who played in the premiere of the work in 1967. The Irish Dances are performed from where Malcolm lived in the 1970s.

Full details from the festival website.