About

In this special concert, Cranbrook Symphony Orchestra is joined by the very distinguished pianist Joanna McGregor for a performance of Grieg's Concerto, one of the most popular in the repertory. The programme opens with some more Scandinavian music, 'Finlandia', in which Sibelius gave voice to his country's ever increasing desire to shake off the Russian yoke, and ends with Dvorak's Symphony No.9 'From the New World', written in America but showing how his homeland remained close to his heart.

Hemsted Park is supporting this concert. All profits to Catching Lives

Joanna MacGregor CBE is one of the world's most innovative and exciting musicians, and much in demand as a professor and competition jury member. As a solo pianist she has appeared with leading orchestras, performing in over eighty countries, with eminent conductors including Pierre Boulez, Colin Davis, Simon Rattle and Michael Tilson Thomas. Joanna is Dame Myra Hess Chair of Piano at the Royal Academy of Music and a Professor of the University of London,  and runs two annual piano festivals for young musicians; she has been Artistic Director of Dartington International Summer School, Bath International Festival, and Deloitte Ignite at the Royal Opera House, as well as a curator for festivals around the world. She has released over forty solo recordings - many of them on her own award-winning record label SoundCircus - ranging from Chopin and Piazzolla to Bach and John Cage. Joanna has commissioned and premiered many landmark works and is a regular broadcaster on TV and radio. Her collaborative and composition projects encompass jazz, film, visual art, contemporary dance and electronica. From 2015-2021 she chaired the Paul Hamlyn Composers Awards and has been a Booker Prize Judge. Joanna MacGregor has five honorary doctorates in music; a regular conductor, she is Music Director of Brighton Philharmonic. 

‘Joanna MacGregor is a brilliant light in the music world’ Classical Review

‘Joanna MacGregor seems incapable of giving performances that are not at once extremely intelligent and entertaining’ Sunday Times

‘Her performances have drive, wit and glittering precision’ The Guardian

‘Joanna MacGregor’s career built on a reinvention of the star virtuoso tradition’ BBC Music Magazine

‘It was the effusive spirit of British pianist Joanna MacGregor that stole the limelight’ The Australian

Location

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Centenary Hall
Hemsted Park, Benenden School, Cranbrook, Kent TN17 4AA

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