Priya Mitchell is amazing. Not only has she enjoyed a hugely successful and international career as a violinist, but she’s founded and nurtured Oxford Chamber Music Festival since 2000, and curated the most wonderful concerts for this year’s 25th anniversary of the festival ‘Eden in Oxford‘.
And what a feast for the senses it was. Take the Echoes of Eden concert performed in Christ Church Cathedral with the virtuoso O/Modernt Chamber Orchestra, led by Hugo Ticciati who took the theme and ran with it. Challenging, dramatic, hypnotic, he deconstructed and reconstructed pieces from as diverse as Hildegard von Bingen (11th century), McCartney and Lennon via Philip Glass, John Taverner and Bach. The packed audience was both transfixed and bewitched.
As the lights dimmed, the music began with a sole percussionist, playing the hand drum, leading the violinists, violists, cellists and double bass players up through the nave of the cathedral, all playing eery and exquisite music, and visibly interacting and responding to one another until the cathedral hummed with life, echoing this newly minted, spiritual music. Intense, uplifting, challenging, it offered a rich new synthesis of music across time and continents.
Intense, uplifting, challenging, ‘Echoes of Eden’ offered a rich new synthesis of music across time and continents.
Anchoring this tightly disciplined, part improvisiation was founder and conductor of the O/Modernt Chamber Orchestra, violist Hugo Ticciati, alongside the Romanian violist Sascha Bota, Chilean-Swedish mezzo-soprano Luciana Mancini (who wrung every ounce of anguish from both the Maria Grever composition, and Bach’s ‘Have Mercy‘), all kept to the heartbeat by the percussionist Nora Thiele. Finally, Priya Mitchell herself joined the orchestra in the second half. It was a performance not to be missed.
As was the Thursday lunch-time concert in The New Space (a gorgeous new performance space in Mansfield Road), with breathtaking performances by Julian Arp (cello), Sasha Bota (viola), Priya Mitchell (violin) playing Bach’s ‘Goldberg Variations’, and Nora Thiele (piano ) playing John Cage’s ‘Dream for a Piano’- but every concert was a gem, challenging players and the audience alike, leaving us enriched, entranced and wanting more!
So watch out for the dates of next year’s festival in September 2026, and set aside a week to dive into the most innovative and thrilling chamber music possible. https://www.ocmf.net
Sheila Bailey
