BURTON Bradstock’s arts festival is renowned for the wide spectrum of music played by ensembles and soloists, led by violinist and artistic director David Juritz, alongside an exhibition of West Country arts, ceramics and crafts in the historic village hall. This year’s 44th annual festival runs from 15th to 23rd August. The majority of the…
NON-professional musicians and instrumentalists across the UK are invited to enter for the BSO Music-Making Competition, which returns for a second year, sponsored by Lark Music, part of Howden. Entry is free and the closing date for applications is 3rd September. The panel of industry judges includes broadcaster and writer Tom Service, guitarist Dagan Wilkin…
THE King and Queen visited Blandford Forum on Thursday 16th July, to see the newly restored Corn Exchange and meet representatives of various cultural and charity groups, including Dorset Opera Festival and Poole’s Lighthouse arts centre. The Lighthouse team, led by chief executive Elspeth McBain and creative engagement manager Martha Earley, were among representatives of…
ANDY Morton, the director of this year’s Dorset Opera Festival production of L’Elisir d’Amore, was born and brought up in Sherborne, where his father was a teacher. It was as a teenager at Sherborne School he first came into contact with opera, joining the chorus of Dorset Opera then run by Patrick Shelley. After studies,…
THE 2026 Dorset Opera Festival brings one of the great tragic dramas of the repertoire to the stage of the Coade Hall at Bryanston School, and the return of a favourite comic opera from 21st to 25th July. There are performances of Saint-Saens’ Samson et Dalila on Wednesday 22nd and Thursday 23rd at 7pm, and…
IFORD Opera – now If Opera – celebrates its 30th anniversary this year, from 6th to 16th August, returning for a second year to Church Farm, Wingfield, near Bradford-on-Avon, with a programme which combines wit, tragic drama, Viennese sparkle, baroque boozing and the golden age of jazz and swing. The opening night, Thursday 6th August,…
CERNE Abbas, with its (in)famous chalk giant, has for 35 years been the setting for one of the region’s most delightful boutique chamber music festivals. This July, founder, Dorset-born clarinettist Richard Hosford brings a group of internationally renowned musicians back to the village for three concerts in the historic St Mary’s Church. Originally based around…
LESSER-known baroque composers, including Barbara Strozzi, take centre place in Ceruleo’s programme for the July series of Concerts at Bridport Arts Centre for the coffee time concert at 11.30am on Friday 10th July, Ilminster Arts Centre at 7.30pm that evening and Saturday 11th at 7.30pm at Crewkerne Dance House. Described as a group that “feels…
FROME celebrates the 25th anniversary of its multi-arts festival this year – and the festival opens on 3rd July, just two days after the funeral of Martin Bax, the actor, former town and district councillor and mayor, who became one of Frome’s most loved and valued citizens. A former actor with the Royal Shakespeare Company, Martin…
BEST-selling novelist, playwright and scriptwriter Chris Chibnall is one of the big draws at this year’s 29th Beaminster Festival. One of Dorset’s prettiest towns has an eclectic and stimulating programme, from 27th June to 5th July, including Chris Chibnall, superstar folk duo Kathryn Roberts and Sean Lakeman, actress and singer Lucy Stevens as the great…