The Barbican's Classical Music division puts the Artist Spotlight on Joyce DiDonato, one of the best-loved vocalists of our time who begins with a performance at Barbican Hall on Thursday 25th September 2014.
The second installment on Friday 10th October 2014 sees her perform a concert performance of Handel's opera Alcina with the English Concert under Harry Bicket, and the series continues into next year with three concerts in April 2015 culminating in the opening concert of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra's Barbican 2015 residency on Friday 17th April 2015.
On 30th November, the BBC Symphony Orchestra will be performing 'The Sound of Chaplin' with music composed by Neil Brand, Timothy Brock and Charlie Chaplin to accompany three films Shoulder Arms, the short Kid Auto Races at Venice, Easy Street, and The Immigrant. Comedian and silent film fan Paul Merton introduces the film and hosts a Q and A with composer Neil Brand.
Also in November, a three-day residency by the Mariinsky Opera is one of the highlights for UK-Russia Year of Culture 2014. The theatre's conductor, Valery Gergiev, showcases two contrasting operas that both deal with archetypal aspects of Russian identity - Mussorgsky's Boris Gudunov (3rd November) and the UK premiere of Rodin Shchedrin's The Left Hander (4th November) - followed by the Mariinsky Chorus singing a programme of Russian Orthodox sacred choral music in Milton Court on Wednesday 5th November 2014.