Gigs

Classical music from across the region...

BBC Symphony Orchestra Symphony Hall, Birmingham, Fri 17 June

Birmingham’s music and spoken-word scene is here celebrated in a special concert that sees the BBC Symphony Orchestra teaming up with talented local performers. Titled Beyond The Bricks Of Brum and bringing together more than 100 musicians, the one-off presentation features brandnew arrangements and compositions from Black Voices, Casey Bailey and Sanity, with contributions also coming from Agaama, TrueMendous, John Bernard and Jasmine Gardosi. The concert is conducted by the BBC Symphony Orchestra’s principal guest conductor, the Kyiv-born Dalia Stasevska (pictured).

Ex Cathedra: Summer Music By Candlelight

St Chad’s Church, Shrewsbury, Tues 14 June; St Peter’s Collegiate Church, Wolverhampton, Thurs 16 June; St Paul’s Church, Birmingham, Tues 21 & Wed 22 June

Jeffrey Skidmore (pictured) once again picks up the baton to conduct Birmingham’s highly rated early music ensemble, on this occasion in a concert that Ex Cathedra confidently predict will see people heading for home singing of summertime. The programmes for these annual gettogethers, presented by candlelight as dusk falls, move seamlessly from seasonal favourites to rare, rediscovered, contemporary and lighter repertoire.

Classical

Ludlow Choral Society: Seven Queens

Ludlow Assembly Rooms, South Shropshire, Sat 11 June

Ludlow Choral Society’s first full-length concert since 2019 features a programme which the ensemble originally intended to perform in 2020 under the title of Music For Six Queens. With the concert now taking place in mid-2022, it’s been renamed Seven Queens, to take into account this month’s celebrations of Queen Elizabeth’s platinum jubilee. The programme comprises music by Purcell, Handel and Byrd.

CBSO: Handel’s Messiah

Symphony Hall, Birmingham, Wed 8 June

The City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra Chorus here gets its teeth into the challenge of performing Handel’s magnificent choral masterpiece for the very first time. A work which tells the story of Christ's Nativity, Passion, Resurrection and Ascension, the Messiah features the rousing Hallelujah Chorus and is one of classical music’s best-known works. Baroque specialist Richard Egarr is the conductor while Mary Bevan (pictured) showcases her skills as soprano.

Shrewsbury Symphony Orchestra

The Abbey, Shrewsbury, Wed 22 June

One of the oldest amateur orchestras in the country here turns its attention to the challenge of performing two symphonies. Louise Farrenc’s First, dating from 1842, is an inventive work bringing together Romanticism and Classicism. Beethoven’s Pastoral Symphony, meanwhile - premiered in 1808 - features a variety of sounds which the later Romantics would view as emblematic of nature.

Key To The City

Birmingham 2022 Festival initiative unlocks hidden treasures, surprise views and intriguing secrets...

A special key which unlocks Birmingham’s hidden treasures, surprise views and intriguing secrets is to be given to thousands of people. This month, for the Birmingham 2022 Festival, the ornamental key associated with the Freedom of the City ceremony is being replaced with a real one. The City of 1,000 Trades will become the City of 15,000 Keys when the Key To The City project begins (on 28 May). The keys will open 22 locks in locations around Birmingham and Solihull. They will be presented at an exchange site under the departure board at Birmingham New Street Station. For six weeks - until 10 July - in a free ceremony, anyone will be able to award the Key to the City to whoever they want, for whatever reason – from thanking them for being a good friend or partner, to wearing great shoes. Then the recipient of the key has until 7 August to explore ‘Birmingham’s secrets’. These include access to a Harry Potter-like secret entrance at Platform One of New Street Station, the 18th floor terrace at 103 Colmore Row and hidden artwork behind a door at the Ikon Gallery. The key-recipients can also open Northfield Community Garden, observe prayers at Green Lane Masjid and unlock a door in the brick arch over the canal at 230-year-old Minworth Green Bridge at the city’s edge. The key comes with a passport revealing the full list of locations. Recipients could get a new perspective on a sporting venue, enjoy after-hours access to familiar public places such as Touchwood Shopping Centre, and make use of their key-given right to open display cases and rooms across the city. Key To The City is being presented by the Birmingham 2022 Festival and Fierce, the Birmingham arts organisation providing the local knowledge for the project’s creator, artist Paul Ramirez Jonas. Paul first held Key To The City in his home city of New York in 2010. Among the places to which the key provided access were a hidden door in the Brooklyn Museum and gates on the George Washington Bridge. Birmingham will be the second host of Key To The City. “Only Birmingham and New York are crazy or brave enough to tackle it!” laughs Paul. “The way I work is to think of an idea that’s completely impossible and fantastical, then pare it down to something practical and within budget, but which still has the magic you need for a public project to capture people’s imagination. One such first