Saved events

New Worlds: Exile

Academy of Ancient Music

The shore of a castaway island

Exile, elegance and adventure: Laurence Cummings and the Academy of Ancient Music follow Joseph Haydn to 18th-century London, in a concert of thrilling emotional extremes.

When Haydn arrived in London in 1791, he triggered a full-scale Georgian media frenzy – and responded with some of his most enduring and imaginative music. This new world offered him fortune as well as fame, and today Laurence Cummings demonstrates why, in a concert that explores the full, glorious range of one of music’s first global superstars.

That means a tempestuous overture from an opera set on a desert island, and a rare performance of the Sinfonia Concertante, in which four of the AAM’s own stars take the spotlight in a witty quadruple concerto, written to delight a fashionable crowd. And at the heart of it all, two extraordinary, impassioned mini-operas. These two cantatas were enormous hits with the London audience, and today you’ll hear why.

The performance ends at approximately 9.30pm, with a 20-minute interval.

Produced by the Academy of Ancient Music

Pre-concert talk

18:30, Milton Court

Musicologist Richard Jones will be speaking about Haydn's career in London.

Become a Patron

Our Patrons get access to tickets for sold-out performances, among other benefits.

Milton Court Concert Hall