Join us to celebrate the upcoming 2024 season at Longborough - a new production of La bohème in the centenary year of Puccini's death, alongside the culmination of our Ring cycle.
With readings and music from some of our brilliant Emerging Artists, we'll also be looking ahead with a first glimpse at the exciting plans for our 2025 programme.
This event will take place at Compton Verney, with drinks in the stunning Naples gallery. Please do come early to explore the grounds. There is a car park on site, a 10 minute walk from the venue. A shuttle bus is available. For more about visiting the venue, see comptonverney.org.uk/plan-your-visit
Naples and the Amalfi coast were a source of inspiration to Richard Wagner. There, he claimed, he had found the garden of Klingsor.
The evening of words and music will feature excerpts from our 2024 and 2025 programme from Sofia Kirwan-Baez (currently studying at the National Opera Studio and making her Longborough debut this summer), prize-winning baritone Edward Jowle and soprano Fflur Wyn (making her Longborough debut as the Woodbird in our 2024 Ring), accompanied by Susie Allan.
Longborough's Artistic Director Polly Graham and Music Director Anthony Negus will also explore their plans for 2025 and beyond. This is also an opportunity to meet our new Executive Director Emily Gottlieb and Chairman Andrew Mosely.
Booking information
Booking is open to Longborough members at Benefactor level and above. Please login to access booking or call Box Office on 01451 830292.
Biographies
Described as a ‘superb singer actress’ (Opera Today), Anglo-Venezuelan soprano Sofia Kirwan-Baez is a Kathleen Ferrier semi-finalist, a Josephine Baker Trust artist, a Sybil Tutton Award holder (2022) and a recipient of the Musicians’ Company Award (2023). She is a Young Artist on the National Opera Studio’s (NOS) Global Talent Programme, generously supported by Lionel and Marylynn Anthony. Operatic roles include Elle/La Voix Humaine, Adina/Elisir d’Amore, Papagena/Die Zauberflöte and World premieres of works by Jasper Dommett, Marco Galvani and Toby Young. Concert work comprises Handel’s Messiah (Nevill Holt 2022), Schoenberg’s Pierrot Lunaire (Birmingham Cathedral, MAC Birmingham), Mahler’s 4th Symphony, Monteverdi’s Vespers (Cadogan Hall), Vivaldi’s Gloria and Handel’s Dixit Dominus (Christ Church Cathedral, Oxford). She made her Wigmore debut in September 2023 as part of their 2023 French Song Exchange.
Having begun her musical studies with the violin in El Sistema in Caracas (Venezuelan), she later started playing the piano, continuing both instruments in the Périgueux Conservatoire. Sofia studied Music at Oxford University and Vocal Performance at the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama, where she graduated with a distinction and was supported by Rotary International. Sofia was a Huffner Scholar supported by the Sir Gordon Palmer Scholarship in the Royal College of Music Opera School and is a winner of the RCM’s Concerto Competition (2021).
Future engagements include a recital with NOS at Wigmore Hall (Jan 2024) and the role of Musetta for Longborough Festival Opera’s La Bohème (Jul/Aug 2024).
A prize-winner of the 2021 Cesti competition and a finalist of the 2021 Kathleen Ferrier Awards, Bass-Baritone Edward Jowle was brought up in Derbyshire and is a recent graduate of the Royal College of Music International Opera Studio. A Samling Artist and an alumnus of the Verbier Festival Atelier Lyrique, he is also the winner of the 2022 Somerset Song Prize. He has received support from the Drake Calleja Trust, The Countess of Munster Trust, Help Musicians UK and The Josephine Baker Trust.
2022/23 includes appearances with English Touring Opera as Emireno/Ottone and Lesbo/ Agrippina in the autumn, and Gubetta/Lucrezia Borgia, Antonio/Il viaggio a Reims and Curio/ Giulio Cesare in the spring. He will sing Handel’s The Messiah in Lincoln Cathedral and with The Really Big Chorus at the Royal Albert Hall, as well as Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs with Sloane Square Choral Society. In the summer he returns to the London Song Festival for the world premiere of Granville Bantock’s song cycle The Sphynx with Nigel Foster and Simon Butteriss.
Recent stage work includes Colline/La bohème (Verbier, Medici TV); Guglielmo/ Così fan tutte (Diva Opera); Papageno/Die Zauberflöte (RCM, OperaVision); Adonis/Venus and Adonis (Pratum Integrum); Polyphemus/Acis and Galatea (Ryedale Festival); Steward/Flight and Garibaldo/Rodelinda (RCM).
Having already gained wide acclaim for her performances on the operatic stage as well as the concert platform, Welsh singer Fflur Wyn has quickly established herself as one of the country’s foremost sopranos.
Operatic highlights include the roles of 1st Niece Peter Grimes (Royal Danish Opera); Dorinda in Handel’s Orlando (Welsh National Opera); Pamina The Magic Flute, Alice Alice in Wonderland, Vivetta L’arlesiana (Opera Holland Park); Malinka The Adventures of Mr Broucek (Grange Park Opera); Lucia Rape of Lucretia (Potsdamer Winteroper); Esilena Rodrigo (Göttingen International Handel Festival); Sophie Werther, Marzelline Fidelio, Susanna The Marriage of Figaro, Morgana Alcina, Gretel Hänsel und Gretel, Sophie Der Rosenkavalier, Fire/Nightingale/Princess L’enfant et les Sortileges and Trio Soprano Trouble in Tahiti (Opera North).
Some of her most notable concert performances include the title role in Handel Theodora (RIAS Kammerchor); Bach Christmas Oratorio (Copenhagen Philharmonic Orchestra); Handel Jephtha (Cappella Amsterdam/Daniel Reuss); Bach B Minor Mass (Royal Northern Sinfonia/Thomas Zehetmair, Orquestra Simfonica de Balears & Al Bustan International Music Festival); Bach St John Passion (National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland and Academy of Ancient Music); Bach St Matthew Passion (Dunedin Consort); Messiah and Ode for St Cecilia's Day (The English Concert/Harry Bicket); Orff Carmina Burana (City of Birmingham Symphony and Royal Scottish National Orchestras).
Susie Allan, one of today’s most perceptive collaborative pianists, has performed with international vocal soloists including Emma Bell, Susan Gritton, Rowan Pierce, and Mark Padmore. She has accompanied masterclasses by Sir Thomas Allen, Elly Ameling and Roger Vignoles at the Britten-Pears School. In demand as a coach and teacher, she has held posts at the Royal College of Music and Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, and adjudicated for the Royal Birmingham Conservatoire’s English Song Prize. She is a visiting piano teacher and coach at Radley College, Abingdon.
As an opera collaborator, Susie has directed Così fan tutte, Rigoletto, La traviata from the keyboard, for Opera à la Carte; played numerous opera galas, and repetiteured for The Classical Opera Company. She is delighted to be working with Longborough Festival Opera for the first time.
In a collaboration with baritone Roderick Williams spanning over twenty years they perform across the UK and internationally. In 2022 for the 150th anniversary of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ birth the duo performed at The Wigmore Hall, LSO St Luke’s, Bath Mozart Fest and Malvern Concert Club. The disc of this programme has just been released to high praise. Susie's next project for SOMM Recordings of Stanford’s Children’s Songs in collaboration with mezzo Kitty Whately and baritone Gareth Brynmor John (released 2022) has also won high praise. She is a regular guest of the UK’s most prestigious venues and concert societies appearing at the Wigmore Hall, Champs Hill, Globe Theatre, and festivals including the Buxton, Endellion, Oxford Lieder and Three Choirs. She has recorded for BBC Radio 3 and for television, and performed in Europe and the US.
