FORTHCOMING EVENTS

The BMS maintains a continuing programme of Lecture-Recitals at the New Cavendish Club, London W1.Details of the next Lecture-Recital will be posted here shortly.

Both Members and non-Members are welcome at the BMS Lecture-Recitals: tickets are priced at £7.00 for Members, and £8.00 to non-Members. Tickets may be purchased on the door, or in advance by sending a cheque made payable to The British Music Society, to Andrew Knowles (30 Florida Avenue, Hartford, Huntingdon, Cambs PE29 1PY); please also supply a stamped addressed envelope for posting tickets to you.

Competitions have been a major feature of BMS’ live music activities, starting with an Opera Competition (British Opera in Retrospect) from 1984-86. Entries included operas by Arthur Bliss, Charles Villiers Stanford, Ethel Smyth, Rutland Boughton and Hamish McCunn. The Awards were presented at The London Coliseum.

From 1988-97 there was a series of Awards for Young Musicians studying at Music Colleges, with a huge variety of composers featured. Prizewinners concerts were held at the Purcell Room (piano, strings), King’s Lynn Festival (voice), Warwick & Leamington Festival (woodwind) and Salisbury Festival (organ). The Voice Awards were incorporated into a sister-project, Song Composer Year, with concerts throughout the country.

In 2004, a new cycle began with the BMS Piano Awards.

In 2000-01, we held the BMS Choral Competition for the Millenenium which included rare works by Frederic d’Erlanger, Arthur Sullivan, John Joubert, George Dyson, Hubert Parry and Edgar Bainton. The prizes were awarded at The Three Choirs Festival. There was also a Song-Writing Competition and supporting concert in 2002 for the Golden Jubilee (with the English Poetry and Song Society).

Another strong field has been lectures and seminars with subjects including Arnold Bax (Lewis Foreman 1983), British Opera from Queen Victoria to the Festival of Britain (2 seminars 1984), Recording British Music (workshop 1985), Edmund Rubbra (Michael Dawney), Sterndale Bennett (Barry Sterndale-Bennett 1987), Scores Lost & Sometimes Found (seminar 1990)), John Foulds (Malcolm MacDonald 1998), and Sullivan Centenary (Stan Meares 2000).

A new series of Lecture-recitals was launched in 2004 with Unjustly Neglected - a Review of BMS Recordings (John Talbot) and The Life and Music of Hamish MacCunn (David Burkett).

Concerts have sometimes been entirely BMS projects, sometimes in association with others, and sometimes sponsored by the BMS.

BMS projects have included three "official" inaugural concerts (1979-81), Benjamin Burrows Centenary Concert (1992), Eugene Goossens Centenary(1993), Piano Recital by the President, John McCabe, CBE (1997), Sixty Glorious Years (1997, with a Foreword by HRH Prince Michael of Kent, an expert on Queen Victoria), and the BMS’s 25th, Roger Quilter’s 50th and Lennox Berkeley’s 100th anniversaries (2003).

Concerts with associates have included 20 concerts, including a Tribute to Sidonie Goossens, (Chelsea College and Goldsmith’s College 1979-82) and Arnold Cooke’s 89th Birthday (Tudeley Festival 1995).

Sponsored concerts have included two at Wavendon (1981/2), The Broadheath Singers (1991-2003), William Baines Centenary (1999), and Malcolm Williamson’s 70th Birthday (2001),

A visit to La Mortella with a concert there was held in 2003. There have also been occasional lunches.