Desperate to find a new job in 1721, Bach wrote a set of instrumental concertos and sent them off to the Margrave of Brandenburg in the hope of getting an offer. Had the Margrave so much as glanced at the score for Six Concertos With Several Instruments Bach had sent…
Tchaikovsky described his Symphony No. 6 as ‘the best thing I have ever composed or will compose.’ It presents the culmination of the composer’s thoughts on life and love, subjects on which this tortured individual had plenty to say, while leading a symphony orchestra to bear its soul and casting…
We are delighted to be welcoming internationally renowned ‘pianist of style and breadth’ (Gramophone), Christoph Eschenbach, to lead the Oxford Philharmonic’s second masterclass of the new year.
Premiered in Birmingham, a German oratorio with a Christian soul composed by a practicing Lutheran from a famously Jewish family, Elijah is the consummate work of bridge-building, understanding and reconciliation. ‘I was able to sway at will the enormous mass of orchestra, choir and organ’ wrote Mendelssohn from the West…
Mahler’s symphonies are his spiritual autobiographies, laying out his experiences and suffering for all to hear. His strikingly confident Symphony No. 1 of 1889 is cast in two parts: first the optimism and energy of youth; then the crisis of rejection and death. Yet Mahler’s symphony powers towards an exultant…
Described by Gramophone as ‘one of today’s most thrilling harpsichordists’, we are delighted to be welcoming Mahan Esfahani to lead the Oxford Philharmonic’s first masterclass of the academic year.
Alasdair always loves travelling from Scotland to join his friends in the Oxford Philharmonic but this time things don’t go quite to plan and he ends up having the most Incredible Journey! Instead of flying direct, he ends up having a riotous ride on boats, broomsticks, cars, carpets, roads, rails,…
Sir John Rutter returns to Oxford for another Christmas celebration in the company of the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra, Merton College Choir and the Choristers of Winchester Cathedral. Sir John’s musical fable Brother Heinrich’s Christmas forms the centrepiece of a programme that features carols and Christmas music old and new including…
Marios Papadopoulos takes the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra through the momentous symphonic dance that is Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7, a work whose pounding, marching and pirouetting permanently realigned western music’s fundamental relationship between rhythm and harmony. Another of our own musicians, Concertmaster Carmine Lauri, is the soloist in the most lyrical…
Angela Gheorghiu, one of the most glamorous and gifted opera singers of our time, returns to perform with the Oxford Philharmonic Orchestra to close the season at the Sheldonian Theatre. Together, they will celebrate a composer to whom she has dedicated a lifetime: Puccini. After landmark appearances as his heroines…