The Prince Consort are named in The Best Classical Music of 2010

In October 2010, The Prince Consort performed a World Premiere of Herbstlieder – a Stephen Hough composition, at the Oxford Lieder Festival.

Fiona Maddocks of The Observer named the group in her article ‘The Best Classical Music of 2010’ where she wrote: “The Prince Consort’s premiere of Stephen Hough’s Herbstlieder was intimate and memorable.” And in a previous review also by Fiona Maddocks she says that “it was a substantial new song cycle which grabbed attention[...]in a stimulating concert by the Prince Consort.” and that the performance “had vitality and conviction, and won enthusiastic applause.”

Hilary Finch of The Times wrote of Hough’s song cycle that “Alisdair Hogarth proved the point, flexing his pianistic muscle in rhapsody, in bare chords and in ripe, overflowing figuration.” Alongside the Hough was another World Premiere of Rorem’s setting of Shakespeare’s Sonnet No 147 -  “a duet of tense, obsessing motifs shared eloquently by the voices of Imbrailo and the tenor Andrew Staples. They were joined by the soprano Anna Leese and the fine mezzo Jennifer Johnston for the Schumann that framed the evening so rewardingly.”

2011 sees The Prince Consort presenting a incredibly exciting tour of Brahms and Schumann Liebeslieder, and with it the premiere of Stephen Hough’s Other Love Songs written specifically for The Prince Consort and their director, Alisdair Hogarth. Alongside this, a supporting CD of this programme that also features Philip Fowke and Stephen Hough performing with The Prince Consort will be released on LINN Records, Gramophone Label of the Year.

The premiere of Other Love Songs, will be performed by The Prince Consort at the Wigmore Hall in June 2011 in a special late night performance connected to Hough’s solo recital on the same night. Stephen Hough will join them for the performance and their exciting new CD will be released two days later on 13 June 2011.