THIS YEAR’S Elgar Festival has been hailed as ‘best event yet’ as Worcestershire towns celebrated the region’s most famous composer with concerts and exhibitions.
More than 500 performers were involved throughout the festival, aged from 8 to 90, reaching an impressive audience of nearly 3,000 over 10 days (May 24 to June 1) across Worcester, Malvern, Lower Broadheath and Pershore.
There were several free events including relaxed concerts, an exhibition and Worcester Concert Brass in Cathedral Square.The full breadth of Elgar’s work was showcased, including major orchestral works, choral, miniatures, part-songs, violin sonata, and his wind quintets performed in the Worcester church where Elgar was organist – St. George’s RC, Sansome Walk.
Themed ‘Celebrate with Elgar’, this year’s Festival brought together world-class professional musicians and artists, local choirs, ensembles and orchestras, placing the music of Worcester’s most famous son alongside that of his contemporaries and some of today’s leading composers and arrangers.
The festival is committed to championing the music of our time, as Artistic Director Kenneth Woods said: “Elgar was a tireless champion of the contemporary music of his own time, and the festival honours his legacy by supporting living composers in as many ways as possible. We are delighted that this year’s festival was so well received.”
Set in the composer’s hometown and surrounding areas, the festival is an annual celebration of Elgar’s music spanning symphonic and string orchestra concerts.
Adrian Gregson, Chair of The Elgar Festival and former Mayor of Worcester added: “We would like to say a very big thank you to all the performers and support teams who made this year’s festival such a fabulous success.”
Since it began – lauded as ‘Critic’s Pick’ in both The Guardian and The Times – the festival has doubled in size and scale and championed Sir Edward to as wide an audience as possible.
It continues to grow annually through an innovative development programme of appealing and accessible events, working with hundreds of both internationally renowned professional artists and amateur musicians and performers of all ages to ensure Elgar really is for everyone.
Visit http://www.elgarfestival.org for more information.
