Friday 11th October – Sunday 13 October 2013

WELCOME to the Leeds Lieder Festival, a feast of song from the great Western European tradition which fuses poetry and music. Nearly all of our greatest composers have been inspired to write songs and yet the genre is still under-represented in today’s concert halls and not well known by the general music-loving public. Leeds has three wonderful chamber music halls with perfect acoustics for singers to communicate the intensity, drama, subtlety, fun and beauty of this most intimate and affecting repertoire and Leeds Lieder makes use of all of them.

Graham Johnson, our Artistic Director, has chosen the most exceptional singers and devised programmes which are imaginative and entertaining. If you are unfamiliar with the song world, this is your opportunity to dip your toes into the stream of great art that you have been missing and join with audience and performers in the buzz of excitement which characterises this festival.

Graham Johnson is revered as the doyen of song accompanists, his reputation based not only on his acclaimed performances with many of the world’s greatest singers but also on his scholarship and imaginative skills in programming. The 100th anniversary of Benjamin Britten’s birth provides a starting point for the programmes and Graham Johnson is well placed to explore Britten’s influences having, in his youth, worked closely with him and Peter Pears.

Our opening and closing programmes are sung by outstanding young British singers. On Friday four of them explore Venice in music from Monteverdi to Gilbert and Sullivan and on Sunday the exceptional baritone Benedict Nelson will close the festival. Recognised as one of the most exciting singers of his generation, he has attracted comparisons with Simon Keenlyside and Gerald Finley and his superb recital of Dichterliebe in the Leeds Lieder Day of Song in 2012 enchanted the audience. We welcome him back with a programme to include the world première of one of our two new commissions.

Leeds Lieder also brings international singers of great distinction, hand-picked by Graham Johnson, to the North of England for the first time.

Download the full programme here