22nd Juneto 2nd July

Artistic DirectorPeter Davis

‘Red Billed Gull’ by Dave Duffney

HO ME O F T HE MAY F L O WER

HIST O RIC

Making WavesWelcome to the Harwich FestivalThis year we seek to celebrate our local talent and the unique beauty of our landscape, history and heritage while still attracting the very best performances and exhibitions in spoken word, visual art, dance and a wide range of music.

We also showcase the outcomes from our wider community activities such as Write Away, 20 20, Harwich Shorts and Up to 20, which demonstrate that the Harwich Festival now provides platforms from which artists, young people and the wider community can develop their artistic output and interest. One example is the Creative Arts Conference we are running in May for all 250 Year 5s in the Harwich and Dovercourt area.

There will be something for everyone and lots you have not seen before. Come along, get involved and be entertained.

Peter DavisArtistic Director Harwich Festival

TicketsPrices vary but lunchtime concerts are free of charge. Season tickets are available.

Tickets go on General Sale from 1st May 2017.

Book on line at www.harwichfestival.co.uk

Harwich Box Office in Harwich Library or by telephone 07425 145022 or on the door.

See Festival website for further information on artists, events, ticketing and general information.

Friends of the Festival: Support the Festival by becoming a Friend. Friends can reserve discounted tickets before General Sale.

@HarwichFestival

07425 145022

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MAKING WAVESMAKING WAVES

Visual Arts

Old Bank Studios will be embracing HF17 with their annual Summer Exhibition of Accessible Art by their artist tutors and a selection of local painters. There will also be a Textile and Stitch Exhibition of students’ work, Taster Sessions in Craft and Art, Pop-Up Tea Room and a temporary Public Sculpture.

Further details on www.oldbankstudios.co.uk

The 1912 Centre will house the 20 by 20 Open Exhibition which is being repeated by popular demand. Anyone who wants to express and communicate is welcome as long as it goes in the 20 by 20 cm square. For example, you could: knit, paint, draw, crochet, stitch, photograph, Instagram, write poems or a story or build up with wood/drift wood/found objects/shells to make a relief. The work needs to be on cardboard, wood, canvas or canvas board. These can be bought as cheap as a pound from well-known local shops.

Making WavesThere will be an open-air show of experimental textile work,celebrating the sea, titled Making Waves. This will be installed on the fence of the Navyard.

Bodgeners, 52 Church Street, Harwich will put on a show entitled Kinoptica which is a synthesis of the terms Kinetic and Optical Art. Some of the artists involved will be revisiting their own working practices from the 60s and 70s and exhibiting rare archive examples.

The Windows on Art Trailwill be organised by Harwich and Dovercourt Camera Club. Examples of their art will be shown in shop windows throughout Dovercourt and Harwich. The cover photograph, Red Billed Gull by Dave Duffney, won best of year for 2016.

The Textile Art Groupwill be putting on an exhibition of innovative images and objects using very advanced and imaginative techniques in the Harwich Town Sailing Club.

Harwich Shortsis a call for all aspiring film makers to make short films, no more than 10 minutes’ duration on any subject by any means or devices.

The selected films are planned to be shown

daily at the Mayflower Project Visitors Centre and at selected times at the Electric Palace Cinema, Harwich, during the Festival.

Other events occurringduring or after the Festival

Up to 20 is the Performing Arts equivalent of 20 by 20. Anyone can book a slot up to 20 minutes’ duration in one of several sessions throughout the Festival to be held at the Bandstand in Cliff Park. These will be advertised in the Festival Programme. Please call into the Harwich Box Office or go online to book your slot.

Primary Schools Choir ConcertClare Leach of Harwich Sing is coordinating the Primary Schools’ Concert this year. This takes place at St Nicholas’ Church on Friday 30th June at 1pm. There will be several combined schools’ songs plus some from each individual school.

‘Festival of the Imagination’ this is being organised by the Grand Theatre of Lemmings on Friday 14th July and replaces the Children’s Carnival. Find out more at www.lemmingstheatre.co.uk

Relax after the Festival with the fabulous Bohem Ragtime Orchestra at the Electric Palace on Wednesday 5th July.

’Beside the Seaside’Harwich festival is proud to be organizing the first Dovercourt beach festival called Beside the Sea on Sunday 13th August from 11am to 6pm.

Baluji Shrivastav performs a special afternoon of mesmerising Indian classical music, accompanied by Sukhdeep Singh on tablas. One of the greatest instrumentalists to come from India, Baluji Shrivastav is a blind musician, who excels in playing the sitar, dilruba and tabla. His incredible versatility has led him to work with acts like Massive Attack, Stevie Wonder and Coldplay and of course many of India’s finest artists.

Drawing widely on her multiple heritages by extending and subverting traditional forms, Samia Malik’s new live show Azaadi: Freedom combines her original bilingual song based on the Ghazal form with the sublime sitar and dilruba of the eminent ‘sitarist to the stars’ Baluji Shrivastav

OBE, the ‘exceptional and versatile’ music of Sianed Jones and projections of English translations of Urdu lyrics and visual art.

DanceFestival Dance starts on the first Friday with a Ceilidh in the Redoubt Fort. Music from The Hosepipe Band and a new epic poem from the Wildman of Wivenhoe, Martin Newell, will entertain you. Food and drink available to purchase.

The Harwich Festival Tea Dance is here again under the expect guidance of Philip Waterman.

Music

GeneralHarwich will be alive with music on the first Saturday with the return of the Harwich Music Collective in conjunction with Tendring CAMRA. Seek out the wonderful Pubs in Harwich and enjoy a beer while listening to folk, jazz, blue grass and ukulele.

HF has teamed up with local promoters Essex Rocks to bring some of the brightest unsigned talent to the Redoubt Fort for an all-day Live Music Festival.

ClassicalFor lovers of Classical Music there are 4 amazing lunchtime concerts followed by a stunning final week-end.

Edward Kemp-Luck returns to his home town to once again play the wonderful organ in St Nicholas’ Church. Edward has won many prizes and is one of the leading organists of our time. One of the highlights of HF16 was

the London Piano Trio and we are delighted that Robert Atchison, violin, and Francis Rayner, piano, will be returning to play Brahms and Debussy Sonatas.

A young pianist in the grand Russian tradition and winner of many awards, Alexander Panfilov, makes his debut with a recital composing of works from Beethoven, Schumann and Prokofiev. Flauguissimo, founded by flautist Yu-Wei Hu and guitarist Johan Löfving, have performed many times at Early Music Festivals to great acclaim. They come to the Festival with a programme of ‘Salon Opera’.

In 2014 the sell-out concert was Madama Butterfly and St Nicholas’ Church will again stage live opera. Pop-up Opera, an innovative touring opera company, aims to broaden the appeal of opera. Archers’ fans, will recognize them as Elizabeth’s ‘Magic Opera’ at Lower Loxley – fame indeed. Pop-up Opera bring the hilarious opera‘Il Matrimonio Segreto’ by Cimirosa.

The final concert of the Festival is performed by Harwich and Dovercourt Choral Society and the Colchester Philharmonic conducted by Patrick McCarthy. The choir will be staging a ‘Last Night of the ‘Festival Proms’ and the concert will include a performance of Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue by the amazing young piano soloist Mengyang Pan. Other favourites will include the Henry Wood Fantasia on British Sea Songs, Verdi’s famous Chorus of the Hebrew Slaves, music from the Merry Widow and more.

Jazz, Contemporary andWorld MusicSunday 25th June is an absolute must for Jazz and Contemporary Music fans. During a 2015 Aldeburgh Music Residency Kit Downes and Tomas Challenger recorded at 5 Suffolk churches ‘Vyamanikal’: a collection of transcendent improvisations where the primordial moans and whistles of remote organs meld with gossamer

saxophone. Kit and Tomas come to St Nicholas’ Church in the afternoon to deftly explore the native nuances and acoustics of our magnificent organ and its surrounding environment.

A creative and surprising violinist, Luca Ciarla easily transcends the boundaries among genres to trace an innovative musical path; a magical acoustic seduction in perfect balance between written compositions and improvisation, traditional and contemporary sounds. The Luca Ciarla Quartet has successfully performed in jazz, classical and world music festivals and concert series in more than fifty countries around the world and Luca is one of the world’s best Jazz violinists.

FolkDavid Mitchell and Graham Vincent are a folk duo who play a mix of traditional tunes alongside songs from around the British Isles which they have arranged for Fiddle and Classical Guitar. They first met playing in a ceilidh band and found they had both trained as Luthiers. So, with shared musical tastes they started playing as a duo and have enjoyed playing together ever since.

Ninebarrow, a multi-award-winning folk duo, are impressing audiences with their innovative and captivating take on the folk tradition. Described by Mike

Harding as sounding ‘damn fine’, Jon Whitley and Jay LaBouchardiere combine breath taking vocal harmonies and melodies, rooted in the British Isles as well as crafting original material. Ninebarrow have been nominated for the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards Horizon Award for best newcomers.

‘Ay up’ its Lucy Ward, making a welcome return. Lucy is a singer-songwriter from Derby. She plays guitar, ukulele and concertina but considers her voice to be her first instrument. After winning the Horizon Award for best newcomer at the 2012 BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards, Lucy’s career has

gone from strength to strength establishing her as one of the hottest performers on the UK Folk scene.

Spoken and Written Word

Spoken and Written Word is an important strand and HF17 sees an even wider offering. Black Sandal Press are returning to perform their combination of poetry, short stories and music and there is also the chance to meet Bardy Thomas, ex voice coach of the Royal Shakespeare Company and Dean of Studies at RADA. The Write Away and Stories, Poems and Reminiscence writing groups have flourished and their work will be showcased in the Festival.

Magical evenings are in store with 2 stagings of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ in Bobbit’s Hole. ‘The Tempest’ in this beautiful location last year was one of the outstanding performances and Dramatic Pause Productions will combine again with local musicians to produce the Dream.

Our local poets will be ‘Making Waves’ on an evening cruise seeking out the tranquil waters of the River Stour. The Festival has teamed up with Harwich Harbour Ferry to provide a wonderful evening of nature and poetry.