Wigmore Hall Announces 2022-23 Season

John Gilhooly, Artistic and Executive Director of Wigmore Hall, today unveils the full line-up of concerts and artists for the 2022/23 concert season from 1 September 2022 to 31 July 2023. Home to the UK's largest classical music concert programme, Wigmore Hall will welcome over 2,500 of the finest singers, instrumentalists and ensembles from within the United Kingdom and beyond in 450 concerts.

Two major milestones of the season are the cementing of relationships with The African Concert Series and the London Contemporary Music Festival. 2022/23 will see The African Concert Series make Wigmore Hall its London home, as part of a multi-year collaboration across the seasons ahead, and there will be a new major partnership between Wigmore Hall and the London Contemporary Music Festival, with events in June 2023 and beyond.

Composers-in-focus for 2022/23 include Cassandra Miller (b. 1976), Lera Auerbach (b. 1973), Gerald Barry (b. 1952) and the Black English composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor (1875-1912). The piano music of Ferruccio Busoni (1866-1924), Maurice Ravel (1875-1937) and Claude Debussy (1862-1918) are subjects of major series led by pianists Kirill Gerstein, Boris Giltburg and Jean-Efflam Bavouzet.

Of the 40 World/UK/London premieres to be performed at Wigmore Hall next season, a particular highlight will be the new string quartet by the British composer Charlotte Bray (b. 1982). Entitled 'Ungrievable Lives', Bray's 13-movement quartet will be presented in conjunction with an eponymous installation by the TBW Drawing Prize-winning British artist Caroline Burraway - comprising 13 children's dresses, handmade from refugee lifejackets gathered by the artist at the Lifejacket Graveyard in Lesvos (Greece), hanging from old iron and brass weighing hooks, above piles of sand. Each dress represents 1 of the 13 million child refugees worldwide, signifying the absent body and evoking memory, absence and loss.

Bray said, "Feeling the weight and seriousness of the current ongoing migration crisis, I feel compelled to respond to it with the means I have. With shocking news stories appearing almost daily, I attempt to imagine and find some way of illustrating what millions of migrants are enduring, in search of safety or a better life. Caroline Burraway has responded to the crisis since 2015 and witnessed first-hand the camps and the situation in the Mediterranean up close. Her installation forms a large part of the stimulus behind my string quartet." The Wigmore Hall presentation, a UK premiere, will be performed by the Castalian String Quartet on 21 October 2022.

Wigmore Hall's 2022/23 season opens on 3 September with the Wigmore Hall/Bollinger International Song Competition. With a total prize money of £34,500, the biennial competition celebrates the art of the song recital and is open to singers and pianists aged 33 and under. Contestants will be required to perform in at least three languages. The young stars emerging from the competition will be followed by some of the most distinguished and beloved singers who appear throughout the season, including Ian Bostridge, Dame Sarah Connolly, Alice Coote, Diana Damrau, Iestyn Davies, Christian Gerhaher, Karita Mattila, Christoph Prégardien and Roderick Williams.

In partnership with BBC Radio 3, the lunchtime concerts every Monday afternoon will be broadcast live on BBC Radio 3 as well as streamed live on Wigmore Hall's website. To date, over 10 million people have engaged with Wigmore Hall's online content since the outbreak of the pandemic in spring 2020.

John Gilhooly, Artistic and Executive Director of Wigmore Hall, said,

"In times of great tumult, art and music provide precious moments of reflection, comfort and consolation. I hope Wigmore Hall continues to be a haven where audiences can experience the beauty and wisdom of great music from the most diverse possible origins.

"I am heartened that our '£5 Tickets for Under 35s' scheme has seen the highest ever take up since the initiative was launched four years ago, bringing many thousands of new, young concertgoers to live performances this season. As we brace ourselves for the economic uncertainties over the coming 12 months, I must thank Friends of Wigmore Hall, a consortium celebrating its 30th birthday, without whose support we cannot do what we do."

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