Bath Mozartfest | November 2023

Each year music pilgrims flock to the beautiful Georgian city of Bath to enjoy a festival celebrating one of Europe’s favourite musical sons: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

The festival – which has garnered critical acclaim for its high calibre performers – showcases not only the music composed by Mozart but also that of composers for whom he provided inspiration. Performances take place in the stunning surroundings of Bath’s historical buildings, and this year all concerts will be held in the elegant 18th century Assembly Rooms.

Our 2023 tour offers a delightful range of performances, beginning with two concerts featuring the prize-winning Spanish string quartet Cuarteto Casals. The first of these will feature works by Mozart, Haydn and Brahms, while the second, which will also feature cellist Adrian Brendel, will include Beethoven’s String Quartet Op 59 No 3 and Schubert’s String Quartet in C major D 956.

Brendel, who holds the post of Visiting Professor of Chamber Music at the Royal Academy of Music, will also return for a performance alongside acclaimed pianist Imogen Cooper, featuring Beethoven’s Variations on Bei Mannern, welche Liebe fuhlen from Mozart’s The Magic Flute, alongside works by Liszt and Debussy.

A further highlight of our tour will be a performance from La Nuova Musica with soprano Lucy Crowe and conductor David Bates, who together will present Mozart’s Symphony No 25 in G minor, as well as Haydn’s Symphony No 4.

Our tour finishes with a concert from prize-winning clarinettist Jonathan Liebovitz alongside celebrated young pianist Ariel Lanyi, and what is sure to be a wonderful concert featuring the Sitkovetsky Trio, who will perform piano trios by Mozart, Beethoven and Schubert.

Alongside the musical programme, our tour will take in further cultural treats on offer in the city of Bath. We hope to include a visit to the Holburne Museum – home to Sir William Holburne’s collection of fine and decorative arts – with an illustrated lecture given by our Tour Director on the Schantz fortepiano (subject to final confirmation). We also look forward to a visit to the city’s iconic abbey.

Completing our itinerary will be an excursion to Wells, England’s smallest city, to enjoy a guided tour of its beautiful Gothic cathedral.

We will stay throughout at the four-star Francis Hotel, set within Georgian townhouses in the heart of Bath.

This tour will be led by Sandy Burnett, MA, a musician and broadcaster who spent over a decade as one of the best-known classical music presenters on BBC Radio 3. He has conducted many orchestras and choirs, and has masterminded a complete cycle of J S Bach’s sacred cantatas.