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The Kilkenny Arts Festival Choir & Orchestra

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Fergus Sheil – Conductor
Finghin Collins – Pianist
Aileen Itani – Soprano
Bridget Knowles – Mezzo-soprano
Christopher Lemmings – Tenor
Raitis Grigalis – Baritone

Programme

LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN (1770-1827)
Choral Fantasy

GIOACHINO ROSSINI (1792-1868)
Stabat Mater

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For the first time in its 37-year history, the Kilkenny Arts Festival hosts a Festival Choir. Amateur choral singers from far and wide will participate in workshops and rehearsals that will culminate in a performance in the magnificent cathedral of St Canice, conducted by Fergus Sheil, who has worked with all the major Irish orchestras, as well as Opera Ireland and Scottish Opera. The programme includes Beethoven's rousing Choral Fantasy and Rossini's Stabat Mater, featuring celebrated tenor Christopher Lemmings, baritone Raitis Grigalis and mezzo-soprano Bridget Knowles, along with two of the performers featured in this year’s programme: pianist Finghin Collins and soprano Aileen Itani, and promises to be another wonderful occasion in St Canice's.

Acclaimed British tenor Christopher Lemmings has sung in leading international opera houses from the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, to Paris, Helsinki and Los Angeles, working with conductors including Sir Simon Rattle, Sir Colin Davis and Edo de Waart. A consummate concert and recital performer, he has collaborated with composers such as Sir Harrison Birtwistle and Thomas Adès, and recently performed Rossini’s Stabat Mater with the RTÉ Concert Orchestra.

Bridget Knowles is a lecturer in Music at Waterford Institute of Technology. Her extensive operatic experience includes performances with Opera Theatre Company and with the prestigious Glyndebourne Festival Opera in the UK.

Raitis Grigalis is one of the most promising young singers to emerge in recent years from the Schola Cantorum in Basel. His career has already seen him perform with such renowned groups as Ensemble Gilles Binchois, White Raven and the Consort of Musicke, and he has also sung with the Irish Baroque Orchestra, who appeared at Kilkenny last year.