PREVIOUS FESTIVALS

The Bramley & Little London Music Festival was launched in 2005, and many of its guests have been students or postgraduates of the great London conservatoires. Indeed, the festival remains grateful for the advice and cooperation that it receives from, in particular, the Guildhall School of Music and Drama.

It is invariably unwise to name names, but there is a view that the first events, in 2005 and 2007, will be especially remembered for the singing of David Stout, the violin playing of Nadia Wijzenbeek, the piano playing of Martin Sturfalt and Evelina Puzaite, and the verse and readings of actors David Robb and Briony McRoberts.

In 2009, the talented Madalina Rusu stood in at very short notice for Evelina Puzaite (stranded in Scandinavia following a piano competition) and the festival moved up a gear with the first appearance of Fine Arts Brass – arguably the best brass quintet at work in the UK – and the thrilling and innovative a cappella ensemble Voces8.

Notable in 2009, too, was the first performance of a work specially commissioned by the music festival: Sligo Fair, by the celebrated North Country composer Arthur Butterworth, was premiered by Fine Arts Brass, its score dedicated to the memory of one of the festival’s firmest supporters, Ian Mason Hill.

Fine Arts Brass returned in 2011, sharing the festival with the equally professional 4Girls/4Harps and the Guildhall’s remarkable Tenorissimi – the "new three tenors", Matteo Dalle Fratte, Alberto Sousa and Alex Tsilogiannis, accompanied by Maite Aguirre. And it is possible that the 2011 festival was the best yet, thanks to its variety of musical offerings as well as the quality of individual artists.

	Matt Butchers