Education

Each year Oxford Lieder expands its education and outreach programme, with events throughout the year and a cluster of activity around the annual Oxford Lieder Festival each October.  It serves people of all ages in and around Oxford.  In 2011 up to 500 people will take part directly in a variety of learning projects lasting from one hour to two weeks.  Over 2,000 will attend as observers at  talks and song masterclasses.  To experience such a high-quality programme centring on singing in the context of one of the most prestigious Festivals in Europe leaves a great impression on those who attend.   

From 14-29 October 2011 The Festival's ever-expanding Education Programme involves:

  • an ambitious creative writing and performance project involving three local primary and secondary schools in Oxfordshire.
  • a five-day International Residential Mastercourse for advanced singers and pianists led by Dame Felicity Palmer
  • an extensive programme of pre-concert lectures, talks and events
  • two study days looking at the effect of Wagner on the work of Hugo Wolf and Franz Liszt.
  • a “Bring and Sing” event giving amateurs of all ages the chance to perform on the famous Holywell Music Room stage, the setting for all the major Festival recitals (29th October, 11am-1.30pm)
  • masterclasses by Hakan Hagegard and by Henry Herford, for University and Music College students and advanced non-professional singers respectively (21 Oct 2.30-5.30pm and 28 Oct 2.30am-5.30pm)
  • a ‘singing for all’ workshop, for adults, to learn harmony songs by ear, with Fiona Dobie (opening weekend)
  • a Composition Workshop with Oxford University lecturers for students presenting newly-written songs, in association with the university's Music Department (27 Oct 2.30-5.30pm).

Free admission events also open the Festival’s doors to many more people:

  • The Schools’ Song Project performance (14 October 2-3pm)
  • Pre-concert Talks each evening at 7pm
  • Free places at recitals allowing people in the Oxford community unused to concerts, including our ‘Over 50s Singing Group’ project members and the isolated or disadvanged to add a new and positive dimension to their lives by hearing live performances.

The fifth Residential Master Course – an intensive five-day series of classes, for early career singer & pianist duos, taken by Dame Felicity Palmer with guest tutors Roger Vignoles, Anna Larsson and Julius Drake and further coaching with Fiona Dobie and Sholto Kynoch - is open to the public (23, 24, 25 Oct, 10am-1pm & 2-6pm daily, North Wall Arts Centre). Outside this, the other education programme events mean we are thus now working with almost every level of singer, from total beginner to adult amateurs to budding professionals.

All sixteen evening concerts will be preceded by talks given by a range of engaging and entertaining speakers, including such authorities as Richard Stokes, Richard Wigmore, Natasha Loges, John Warren and Roderick Swanston.

If you would like to support any area of Oxford Lieder’s education work, from a small donation to help cover the costs of the Schools Project to supporting a bursary for the M0aster Course, please do contact our Development Officer Peter Burrows: peter@oxfordlieder.co.uk.