What's On: Our 2011/12 Season

JAMES MACMILLAN
EDINBURGH STRING QUARTET
MAXIMILIANO MARTÍN, clarinet

Beethoven, String Quartet in F Major, Op. 135
Macmillan, For Sonny - World Premiere
Macmillan, Tuireadh
Mozart, Quintet for Clarinet and Strings

James MacMillan read music at Edinburgh University and took Doctoral studies in composition at Durham University with John Casken. After working as a lecturer at Manchester University, he returned to Scotland and settled in Glasgow. The successful premiere of Tryst at the 1990 St Magnus Festival led to his appointment as Affiliate Composer of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Between 1992 and 2002 he was Artistic Director of the Philharmonia Orchestra's Music of Today series of contemporary music concerts. MacMillan is internationally active as a conductor, working as Composer/Conductor with the BBC Philharmonic between 2000 and 2009, and appointed Principal Guest Conductor of the Netherlands Radio Chamber Philharmonic from 2010. He was awarded a CBE in January 2004.

Works by MacMillan also include Seven Last Words from the Cross for chorus and string orchestra, screened on BBC TV during Holy Week 1994, Inés de Castro, premiered by Scottish Opera and toured to Porto in 2001, a triptych of orchestral works commissioned by the London Symphony Orchestra: The World's Ransoming, a Cello Concerto for Mstislav Rostropovich, and Symphony: 'Vigil' premiered under the baton of Rostropovich in 1997, and Quickening for The Hilliard Ensemble, chorus and orchestra, co-commissioned by the BBC Proms and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

The Edinburgh Quartet was founded in 1960 and quickly became established as one of Britain's foremost chamber ensembles, appearing regularly at prestigious venues across the country including London's Wigmore Hall and The South Bank Centre. It achieved international recognition after winning the Contemporary Prize at the Evian-les-Bains String Quartet Competition and has since toured extensively across Europe, the Far East, North and South America and the Middle East. The Quartet have made numerous BBC TV and BBC Radio 3 broadcasts and can also be heard on Classic FM. 2010 marks the Quartet's fiftieth anniversary and it is now one of the longest running chamber ensembles in the UK with a busier performing schedule than ever before.

The Quartet is resident at Glasgow University and Edinburgh Napier University and also collaborates with Aberdeen and Edinburgh Universities. In addition to a regular classical concert series at each of these institutions, the Quartet is committed to nurturing talent and championing new music. The ensemble has worked with many important and prolific composers of our age, including the Quartet's patron, James MacMillan and Michael Tippett, who selected the Edinburgh Quartet's recording of his First Quartet for re-release on EMI shortly before his death.

This recording is representative of the Edinburgh Quartet's extensive discography available on various labels such as Delphian, Linn, Meridian and RCA. Recent recordings include the complete Hans Gal String Quartets ('Editor's Choice' Gramophone Magazine, 2007), the complete Kenneth Leighton String Quartets ( 'The unanimity of their ensemble, even at the densest polyphonic moments in flying scherzo tempo, is very impressive.' BBC Music Magazine), as well as discs of Bartok, Robert Crawford, Haydn, Schubert and Thomas Wilson. Future releases include the complete Matyas Seiber Quartets on Delphian Records, which were featured on a live broadcast by the Edinburgh Quartet on BBC Radio 3.

The BELCEA QUARTET

Beethoven, Quartet in F, Op. 18, no. 1
Beethoven, Quartet in C, Op. 59, no. 3
Beethoven, Quartet in A minor, Op. 132

The Belcea Quartet has gained an enviable reputation as one of the leading quartets of the new generation. They continue to take the British and international chamber music circuit by storm, consistently receiving critical acclaim for their performances. The Quartet was established at the Royal College of Music in 1994 and has since been coached by the Chilingirian, Amadeus and Alban Berg Quartets. They are the Associate Ensemble at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, London and are Quartet in Residence at the Atheneum Concert Hall in Bucharest.

The Belcea Quartet has an exclusive recording contract with EMI Classics and won the Gramophone Award for best debut recording in 2001. Subsequent recordings for EMI include Schubert quartets, Brahms' String Quartet Op. 51 No. 1 and second String Quintet with Thomas Kakuska, Fauré's La Bonne Chanson with Ian Bostridge, Schubert's Trout Quintet with Thomas Adès and Corin Long, a double disc of Britten's string quartets, Mozart's "Dissonance" and "Hoffmeister" quartets, and, most recently, the complete Bartók quartets, for which the Quartet was awarded the title Chamber Music Ensemble of the Year by Germany's prestigious Echo Klassik Awards and nominated for a 2008 Gramophone Award.

The Belcea Quartet's international engagements regularly take them to the Vienna Konzerthaus and Musikverein, Amsterdam's Concertgebouw, Brussels' Palais des Beaux Arts, Lisbon's Gulbenkian, Zurich's Tonhalle, Stockholm's Konzerthuset, Paris' Chatelet and Opera Bastille, Milan's Sala Verdi, New York's Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center and San Francisco's Herbst Theatre, and to festivals including Luberon, Istanbul, Trondheim, Lausanne, Salzburg, Mecklenburg, and the Schwarzenberg Schubertiade.

In the UK they regularly appear at the Edinburgh, Aldeburgh, Perth, Bath and Cheltenham festivals, and at the Wigmore Hall where they were resident Quartet from 2001 to 2006.

They regularly work with leading instrumentalists including Thomas Adès, Isabelle van Keulen, Michael Collins, Paul Lewis, Imogen Cooper, Yovan Markovitch, Natalie Clein, Piotr Anderszewski and Valentin Erben. Recent collaborations with singers have included performances of Mahler's Des Knaben Wunderhorn with Ann Murray and Simon Keenlyside; Schoenberg's String Quartet no.2 and a new commission by Joseph Phibbs for string quartet and voice with Lisa Milne at Wigmore Hall; Fauré's La Bonne Chanson with Anne Sofie von Otter at the Cité de la Musique, Paris, Respighi's Il Tramonto with Angelika Kirchschlager at the Langeland Festival and with Ian Bostridge at New York's Zankel Hall and Washington's Library of Congress.

Larry Zazzo (countertenor) with Arcangelo, directed by Jonathan Cohen.

Programme includes masterpieces by Handel, Vivaldi and Porpora.

The American countertenor Lawrence Zazzo is one of the most outstanding singers of his generation. A native of Philadelphia, and a graduate in both Music and English from Yale and King's College Cambridge, Lawrence made his operatic debut as Oberon A MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM to great acclaim while completing his vocal studies at the Royal College of Music, London.

He has since appeared in many of the world's finest opera houses and concert halls. His opera roles include the title role in Giulio Cesare (Metropolitan Opera New York, Paris, Brussels, Seville, Bilbao), the title role in Gluck's Orfeo (Netherlands), Oberon A Midsummer Night's Dream (Lyon, Toronto), Gualtiero in Scarlatti's Griselda (Berlin Staatsoper, Innsbruck Festival); Goffredo Rinaldo (Berlin Staatsoper, Opéra de Montpellier); Ottone Agrippina (Brussels, Frankfurt, Theatre de Champs-Elysees), the title role in Radamisto (English National Opera), Ottone L'incoronazione di Poppea (Berlin, Brussels, Munich, Vienna); Endimione La Calisto (Munich, Brussels, Paris), Arsamene Serse (Theatre des Champs-Elysees, English National Opera), and the title role in Handel's Sosarme (Sao Carlos, Lisbon).

Lawrence is also closely associated with 20th century and contemporary music. His Paris Opera debut was as Kreon in Liebermann's MEDEA. He created the role of Trinculo in Thomas Ades' THE TEMPEST at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden and he has sung Sciarrano's LUCI MIE TRADITRICI in Brussels and New York. He is closely associated with the role of Mascha in Peter Eotvös' THREE SISTERS which he has performed with the Opera de Lyon, La Monnaie, Hamburg Opera, Edinburgh Festival, Vienna Festival, and in the Netherlands. He made his BBC Symphony Orchestra debut in their commission of Jonathan Dove's HOJOKI, and sang the Refugee in Dove's FLIGHT for Glyndebourne.

Lawrence has a working relationship with many distinguished conductors in the fields of Baroque and contemporary music, including René Jacobs, William Christie, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Christophe Rousset, Harry Bicket, John Nelson, Ivor Bolton, James Conlon, Joshua Rifkin, Christopher Hogwood, Peter Eötvos, Jean-Claude Malgoire, Trevor Pinnock, Jordi Savall, Harry Christophers, and Paul Goodwin. He was the first western countertenor invited to China to sing Messiah at the Shanghai Opera. His international concert career highlights include: Jephtha in Graz with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Theodora in Halle with Trevor Pinnock, the title roles of Handel's Lotario and Riccardo Primo with the Kammerorchester Basel in a European tour and recording with Paul Goodwin, Messiah with Rene Jacobs and the Freiburger Barockorchester and in Notre Dame Cathedral with John Nelson and L'ensemble orchestrale de Paris, Bach Lutheran Masses under Joshua Rifkin in Leipzig, the St. Matthew Passion in Ambronay and Köthen with the Akademie fuer Alte Musik, the title role in Handel's Amadigi with Christopher Hogwood and the AAM in London and Birmingham, the title role in Mozart's Ascanio in Alba with the Berliner Symphoniker, Vivaldi's Nisi Dominus and Gloria with the Israel Camerata, the B Minor Mass in Gdansk, and Saul in Berlin and Lisbon with René Jacobs and Concerto Köln. An accomplished recitalist, he has given many around Europe, most recently at the Rheinvokal Festival, the MA Festival Bruges, the Festival d'Opera Baroque de Beaune and the Wiener Konzerthaus.

Future plans include the title role in Gluck's Orfeo in Toronto, his first Farnace in Mitridate in Munich with Ivor Bolton, and a solo programme of Mozart arias for alto with Ian Page and the Classical Opera Company at the Wigmore Hall in September.

His recordings include Rinaldo, Messiah, Griselda and Saul for Harmonia Mundi; Serse and Fernando for Virgin Classics, Partenope for Chandos, Deborah for Naxos, Britten's Rejoice in the Lamb and Pergolesi's Stabat Mater for Columns Classics, Riccardo Primo, Duetti Amorosi, and Athalia for Sony BMG, as well as Byrdland, the music of William Byrd and Dowland with the Paragon Saxophone Quartet, for Landor Records. A solo recital of early and contemporary mad songs for countertenor and lute, Lunarcy, has just been released on the EPR Classic label.