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Highlights of recent seasons include European and US tours with countertenor David Daniels, a recording of Handel arias with Mark Padmore that won a 2008 BBC Music Magazine award, Handel’s Samson at the 2009 BBC Proms, residencies at the Victoria & Albert and Handel House museums in London, and the first English Concert Master Class for young harpsichordist-directors in London.
In 2007 Harry Bicket was appointed Artistic Director and has led the orchestra in tours to the United Arab Emirates, Germany, Austria, Spain, France and the USA. Bicket is renowned particularly for his work with the finest singers of the age, and English Concert collaborators include Vesselina Kasarova, Anna Caterina Antonacci, Sara Mingardo, Lucy Crowe, Elizabeth Watts, Ian Bostridge, Daniele de Niese, Rosemary Joshua and Sarah Connolly.
In London the orchestra presents an annual series at Wigmore Hall and Barbican Hall appearing regularly at the BBC Proms, Spitalfields Festival and Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music. In the UK they are regular visitors to St George’s Bristol.
Forthcoming engagements include concerts in New York and Washington with Alice Coote, a return to the Barbican Hall Great Performers series in London with Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater, touring also to France and Belgium, and a chamber music tour of the Canary Islands. In 2011 The English Concert will return to the United States with Harry Bicket and Andreas Scholl, and from 2013 will present three Handel operas at Carnegie Hall in successive seasons.
Among the most recorded of chamber orchestras, The English Concert has more than 100 recordings for Deutsche Grammophon to its credit and a series of critically acclaimed CDs for Harmonia Mundi USA directed by violinist Andrew Manze. Their first CD with Harry Bicket – Bach arias with David Daniels – has been followed by Handel Duets with Rosemary Joshua and Sarah Connolly, and recordings with Albrecht Mayer, principal oboist of the Berlin Philharmonic, and recorder virtuoso Maurice Steger. Forthcoming releases include Lucy Crowe’s debut recital album, Bach cantatas with Elizabeth Watts, and Ian Bostridge’s first recording with the orchestra.
The English Concert works with distinguished guest directors, including oboist Alfredo Bernardini, violinist Fabio Biondi and harpsichordists Kenneth Weiss and Laurence Cummings, who is a regular collaborator.
