The BRIT Classic Awards 2004 - Show Programme

Royal Albert Hall 26th May 2004
classicalbrits.co.uk
Promoted by

RENÉE FLEMING
WINNER OF
OUTSTANDING
CONTRIBUTION
TO MUSIC
AWARD
“the world’s leading soprano...” The Sunday Times
“one of opera’s brightest stars” Classic FM Magazine
www.deccaclassics.com/artists/fleming

UNIVERSAL CLASSICS
THE NO.1 CLASSICAL COMPANY
q
www.universalclassics.com

the voice of classical music

Performers
(top to bottom)
Katherine Jenkins
Renée Fleming
Nigel Kennedy
Vanessa Mae
Amici Forever
Bryn Terfel
Catrin Finch
Hayley Westenra
CONTENTS
4 Classical BRIT Awards Welcome
& Katie Derham
5 The ECO and conductor Simon Wright
6 Renée Fleming
7 Hayley Westenra & Vanessa Mae
9 Nigel Kennedy & Amici Forever
11 Bryn Terfel & Catrin Finch
13 Katherine Jenkins & King’s College, Cambridge
15 BRIT School & BRIT Trust
16 In the Beginning
18 The Classical BRIT Awards Launch 2004
THE AWARDS
23 Female Artist of the Year
25 Male Artist of the Year
26 Album of the Year
28 Ensemble/Orchestral Album
29 Critics’ Award
31 Young British Classical Performer
33 Contemporary Music Award
AT–A–GLANCE GUIDE
36 The Classical BRIT Awards nominations in full
As we approach the fifth Classical BRIT
Awards it is with great pleasure that I reflect
over the past years and recall the memorable
and stellar performances we have witnessed
from such incredible artists as Angela
Gheorghiu, Sir Simon Rattle, Cecilia Bartoli,
Vanessa-Mae, Lesley Garrett, Nigel Kennedy,
OperaBabes, Bryn Terfel, Magdelena Kozena,
Maxim Vengerov, Russell Watson and Andrea
Bocelli, culminating in the truly historic duet
‘The Pearl Fishers’ from Andrea Bocelli and
Bryn Terfel which was
a world exclusive when
performed as the finale
of last year’s show.
The Classical BRITs
is one of the world’s
most successful
shows in this genre
with TV audiences in
their millions and has
resulted in not only bringing new audiences
to classical music but also introducing new
artists to a public eager to hear more.
This year is no exception and combines some
of the greatest names in classical music with
emerging new young talent.
We are very pleased to announce our
sponsors National Savings and Investments
for this year’s event and we look forward to
a happy association.
Sit back and enjoy the show.
Rob Dickins
Classical BRIT Awards Chairman
classicalbrits.co.uk
The Classical BRIT Awards 2003
WATCH THE CLASSICAL BRIT AWARDS 2004
ON SUNDAY 30TH MAY
WHAT’S ON
Introduced by your show host Katie Derham
Performance
Vanessa Mae Sabre Dance
Presentation
Young British Classical Performer
Performance
Bryn Terfel Bugielio’r Gwenith Gwyn
Presentation
Critics’ Award
Performance
Choir of King’s College, Cambridge
Panis angelicus
Lift thine eyes
Presentation
Ensemble/Orchestral Album of The Year
Performance
Hayley Westenra Pokarekare Ana
Performance
Katherine Jenkins Questo è per te
Presentation
Outstanding Contribution to Music Award
Performance
Renée Fleming O mio babbino caro
Performance
Nigel Kennedy
Vivaldi: Violin Concerto in A minor – Larghetto
Vivaldi: Violin Concerto in A minor – Allegro
Vivaldi: Summer from The Four Seasons – Adagio
Vivaldi: Summer from The Four Seasons – Presto
Presentation
Contemporary Music Award
Presentation
Male Artist of The Year
Performance
Amici Forever
Prayer In The Night
Whisper of Angels
Presentation
Female Artist of The Year
Presentation
National Savings and Investments
Album of The Year
Performance
Bryn Terfel & Renée Fleming
Bess, you is my woman now
Finale
The English Chamber Orchestra
All Performances Subject To Change
3

Welcome
It has been a massive year for
classical music, one in which a crop
of sensational young talent has shot
to stardom.
The classics made headline news,
and not just in the broadsheets.
First, Myleene returned to her
classical roots. Then Channel 4’s
Operatunity captured the hearts of
viewers hooked by the passion and
determination of the competition’s
winners. Vanessa-Mae’s return to the
recording studio and forthcoming
album release appear set to attract
even more column inches this autumn.
As ever, the Classical BRIT Awards
pays tribute to the widest range of
artists and repertoire with a show that
promises to be the most exciting yet.
Tonight’s rundown of nominees reads
like a Who’s Who of classical music.
Legendary figures such as Sir Colin
Davis, Mstislav Rostropovich and
Luciano Pavarotti are in the running,
in company with thrilling artists from a
younger generation, Sir Simon Rattle,
Renée Fleming, Nigel Kennedy,
Maxim Vengerov and Bryn Terfel
among them.
Maxim Vengerov at the Classical BRIT Awards 2003
photo: jmenternational.com
Katie Derham
4
If there were a Richter Scale for
enthusiasm, then Katie Derham’s passion
for classical music would surely register a
seismic shock of massive proportions.
The ITV News presenter and media and
arts editor has played an impressive
part in boosting listening figures at
Classic FM since she joined the radio
station’s team almost two years ago. Her
Saturday afternoon show is attracting
new listeners at a cracking rate, drawing
over 10,000 extra fans every month and
winning loyal converts to the classics.
Above all, she’s determined to blast
away the barriers erected around
classical music by those who regard
it as an art form for the exclusive few.
“There’s much less silly snobbery now
about classical music than there used to
be,” she observes. “It’s now okay to like
Debussy as well as Dido, Britten as well
as Britney.”
Katie, who studied piano during her
schooldays in Cheshire, returns to host
the Classical BRITs for the fourth time
in succession. “I remember when I
first hosted the Classical BRIT Awards
three years ago, it was possibly one
of the most terrifying jobs I’d ever
done,” she recalls. “Standing in front
of 4,000 people, an 80-piece orchestra
and artists such as Angela Gheorghiu,
Kennedy and Simon Rattle was a world
away from my usual working view of
three cameras and a floor manager!”
Those first-night nerves have long been
replaced by feelings of delight and
excitement at the prospect of meeting
and hearing great names from the world
of classical music.

The ECO at the Classical BRIT Awards 2003
photo: jmenternational.com
The English Chamber Orchestra
Only a handful of orchestras can rely on
instant international recognition from their
acronyms alone.
The English Chamber Orchestra is one
of them, known simply to millions of
classical music fans worldwide as the
ECO and admired by all for its versatility
and the eloquence of its playing. Since
its foundation in 1960, the orchestra has
stamped its musical mark on the classical
scene, attracting countless new devotees in
recent years thanks to its appearances at the
Classical BRIT Awards. It reached its biggest
audience, estimated to number around
one billion people, when it played at the
wedding of the Prince of Wales and Diana in
St Paul’s Cathedral.
One of tonight’s nomines for Male Artist
of the Year, Sir Colin Davis, conducted the
ECO on its first national tour in 1961. The
composer and all-round performer Benjamin
Britten also worked with the orchestra for
the first time that year, creating a partnership
that lasted until his death in 1976 and
yielded definitive recordings of such works
as Albert Herring, The Burning Fiery Furnace
and the Cello Symphony. During the 1970s
the ECO regularly appeared with classical
music’s golden couple, Jacqueline du Pré
and Daniel Barenboim.
Simon Wright makes a return visit to the
Royal Albert Hall after his triumphant
appearance at last year’s Classical BRITs.
The Sunderland-born conductor absorbed
the rudiments of his trade from one of
the greats, observing Sir John Barbirolli’s
painstaking rehearsal methods from his seat
as accompanist to the Hallé Choir. After
graduating from the Royal Manchester
College of Music, young Simon was
appointed organist at Ampleforth Abbey.
He has been Conductor and Artistic Adviser
of the Leeds Festival Chorus since 1975, and
is set to conduct the UK premiere of Markus
Stockhausen’s Christus with them in Ripon
Cathedral on 10 July.
As a prize-winner in the 1986 Leeds
Conducting Competition, Simon’s podium
talents were spotted by the managements
of Britain’s leading orchestras. He has since
worked with the Philharmonia Orchestra,
the BBC Philharmonic, Royal Liverpool
Philharmonic, English Northern Philharmonia
and Northern Sinfonia.
Simon’s harpist wife, Honor, is a busy
freelance performer and teacher, and their
two sons are also members of the music
profession in London.
Conductor – Simon Wright and Katie Derham in 2003
5

Renée Fleming
6
America’s favourite soprano is fast becoming
Britain’s favourite, too, thanks not least to
her acclaimed recordings for Decca and
recent sold-out concerts in Birmingham,
Edinburgh and London.
Renée is undisputed queen of the Metropolitan
Opera in New York, where her roles have
included everything from Richard Strauss’s
Arabella and Marschallin to Bellini’s Il pirata
and Violetta in La Traviata. She has just
performed her signature role as Dvorák’s
Rusalka at the Met and is set to take the
lead part in Richard Strauss’s Capriccio at the
Palais Garnier in Paris next month. In short,
La Fleming is diva-in-demand at the world’s
leading opera houses and concert halls.
She came by singing as naturally as most
children come by their mother tongue,
encouraged by her vocal teacher parents.
“I had to sit next to my mother all day long
while she gave voice lessons,” recalls Renée.
“It’s like I had no choice. I was in all kinds of
musical productions, in the chorus of this and
that.” Jazz was her passion at first, although
she was converted to the classics by voice
coach Patricia Misslin and developed her skills
in that direction to such a high level that she
gained a place at the prestigious Juilliard
School of Music in New York.
Renée’s big break came in 1988 when she
stepped in to sing Mozart’s Countess at the
eleventh hour in Le nozze di Figaro for Houston
Grand Opera, appearing in company with Sir
Thomas Allen. Debuts at the Rossini Festival in
Pesaro and Milan’s La Scala helped establish
her reputation as one of the brightest young
sopranos in the early 1990s, boosted further
when Sir Georg Solti invited her to sing in live
recordings of Mozart’s Così fan tutte and Don
Giovanni at the Royal Festival Hall. The Toronto
Globe and Mail got it spot on when one of its
reviewers summarised Renée’s appeal in two
well-chosen sentences: “Fleming’s lyric soprano
has the one thing that every great singer needs,
an unmistakable, distinctive, individual timbre.
Commanding intelligence and musicianship
take the gift even further, allowing her to
interpret communicate on the highest level.”
Over the last decade, Renée has continued
to explore new repertory, putting her fluent
German to striking effect in the operas of
Richard Strauss. In 1998 she starred alongside
Bryn Terfel and Cecilia Bartoli, wowing critics in
Jonathan Miller’s new production of Le nozze di
Figaro at the Met. The following year she won a
Grammy Award for her Decca solo album, The
Beautiful Voice, repeating the achievement in
2003 for her Bel Canto disc. The mantelpiece
of Renée’s Connecticut home also supports her
Classical BRIT Award as Best Female Artist of
2003, an honorary doctor of music degree from
the Juilliard and two Gramophone Awards for
her recording of Rusalka.

Hayley Westenra
Hollywood producers in search of the perfect
feelgood storyline would do well to scan the
Hayley Westenra factfile. In fact, they’d do even
better to invite the 17-year-old Kiwi songstress
to star in a biopic based on her achievements
to date. At her present rate of progress, there’s
bound to be enough material for a sequel or two!
Young Hayley, eldest daughter of a prodigiously
talented family from Christchurch in New Zealand,
put her burgeoning musical gifts to good use at
the age of 10 when she began busking in a local
shopping mall. She’d already scored the popular
vote as performer in umpteen stage shows and
talent contests, and had recently been accepted as
a pupil of Dame Malvina Major, New Zealand’s
second most famous operatic Dame.
Thanks to an appearance on NZ television’s
MacDonald’s Young Entertainers and the
generosity of a local franchisee of the ubiquitous
burger chain, the Westenras were able to press
1000 copies of their oldest daughter’s demo disc
and ensure it was stocked in record stores. One
of Hayley’s albums landed on the A&R desk
of Universal Music Group in New Zealand, its
contents judged to be sufficiently strong to justify
signing a five-album deal with the singer within
weeks of her 11th birthday.
As if the deal itself wasn’t extraordinary enough,
Hayley’s first album rocketed to the top of the
Kiwi pop charts and has gone on to become the
best-selling disc by a local artist ever released
in New Zealand. The singer’s blend of vocal
allure, charm and honesty produced magical
results again with her UK debut release Pure,
which includes tracks by such legends as
Sir George Martin and Karl Jenkins, a cover
version of Kate Bush’s Wuthering Heights,
‘In trutina’ from Orff’s Carmina Burana, and
traditional Maori songs.
Pure became the fastest-selling debut album in
the history of the UK classical charts, entered the
Top 10 of the pop album charts and continues
to roll on with an unstoppable force. “You do
feel the pressure at times and it can be nervewracking,”
admits Hayley. “I think you have to
accept that the pressure will be there and just
do your best. My parents have always supported
me in everything I’ve ever wanted to do, and that
makes it so much easier.”
Hollywood, by the way, has already woken up
to the Westenra magic. Hayley has just recorded
the end titles for Disney’s Mulan 2 and has been
asked to feature in a new Disney blockbuster
later this year.
Vanessa-Mae
From Walsall to Warsaw, Wigan to Wyoming,
eager fans will tell you that Vanessa-Mae is in
a class of her own. The 25-year-old violinist
has sold over eight million discs, performed
to vast audiences in arena concerts across
the globe, and changed ingrained attitudes
about the image of classical music. She also
pioneered classical crossover, storming the
pop charts in 1995 with the release of The
Violin Player and taking the fiddle into
rock, acid jazz and techno territory with
subsequent releases.
“I come to life on stage,” says Vanessa-
Mae. And how! Her energy-packed
performances generate enough electricity
to power the National Grid. Cast your mind
back to the inaugural Classical BRIT show in
2000. Vanessa-Mae set the whole thing off to
an unforgettable start, pumping out Toccata
and Fugue to the accompaniment of
fireworks and a rocking rhythm section.
Small wonder that this powerhouse
musician has been described as ‘the classical
equivalent of a rock legend’.
It’s been two years since Vanessa-Mae’s last
album hit the shelves, providing a ‘Best of’
album charting her amazing contribution
to crossover classical and pop music. This
September sees the release of Dances with
Time, her first disc for Sony. The tracklist
credits make for mouth-watering reading,
including new pieces and arrangements
by Vangelis, southern Indian composer VK
Raman, Queen Symphony composer Tolga
Kashif, and Walter Taeib, composer of The
Alchemist Symphony.
“Once you’ve tasted classical crossover,”
explains Vanessa-Mae, “because there’s a
creative, raw element to it that doesn’t exist
in just interpreting the classics, you can’t say
goodbye to it.” Predictions are that masses
will want to say hello to Dances with Time.
“I’ve tried many things in my career and I’d
say this new album is a coming together of
those experiences.”
Born in Singapore in October 1978, Vanessa-
Mae moved to London with her Chinese
mother three years later. She took piano
lessons at an age when most kids are still
learning to build mud pies and began to study
violin at the age of five. She gave her first
public recital soon after her ninth birthday,
made her concerto debut the following year
with the Philharmonia Orchestra, and had
recorded three classical albums by the time
she entered her teens. The Violin Player
placed 16-year-old Vanessa-Mae directly in the
media spotlight, especially so when she was
nominated for the Best Female Artist at the
1996 BRIT Awards.
7

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photo: jmenternational.com
Nigel Kennedy
“People can say I’m a classical violinist if
they want to but I’ve always viewed myself
as a musician who plays music and not just
a certain part of it.” It’s got to be said that
Kennedy is rather good at playing music of
all types. So good, in fact, that he has won
the respect and admiration of colleagues
who specialise in any one of the genres he
regularly tackles.
His interpretations as a classical artist, always
alive and spontaneous, have touched even
greater depths of maturity and insight in recent
years. The same is true of Kennedy’s work
in jazz, another lifelong passion. He has also
followed other natural inclinations to create
deeply personal tributes to Jimi Hendrix and
The Doors, and compose and record his own
album, Kafka.
Two decades have passed since the release
of Kennedy’s Gramophone Award-winning
recording of Elgar’s Violin Concerto. Since then,
he’s made over 30 discs that cover everything
from the central works of the classical concerto
repertory to the roots of Eastern European folk
music, head in his latest collaboration with Polish
band Kroke, East Meets East. The common link
between each album lies in Kennedy’s absolute
conviction that he should always get beneath
the surface of a composition. “If you’re playing
within your capability, what’s the point?” he
asks. “If you’re not pushing your own technique
to its own limits with the risk that it might just
crumble at any moment, then you’re not really
doing your job.”
The 48-year-old fiddler returns for his third
appearance at the Classical BRITs, which
he helped launch in 2000 with a typically
impassioned performance of the Meditation
from Massenet’s opera Thaïs. He also scooped
the inaugural Outstanding Contribution to
Classical Music Award, just recognition for his
multi-million selling first recording of Vivaldi’s
The Four Seasons and a whole lot more besides.
In 2002 Nigel followed in the footsteps of
his teacher and mentor, Yehudi Menuhin,
becoming artistic director of the Polish
Chamber Orchestra. With a home in Krakow,
a Polish wife and ongoing collaborations with
Kroke, the Brighton-born Villa fan has certainly
broadened his cultural horizons eastwards in
recent times.
The Vivaldi Experience and dates with Kroke are
presently filling the Kennedy diary. On 8 June
he’s set to appear at the Hampton Court Festival,
returning to the UK with Kroke at the end of July
for the WOMAD Festival in Reading.
Amici forever
Classical crossover has come on by leaps and
bounds since a bunch of Spanish monks scored
an unlikely pop hit with pure Gregorian chant a
decade ago. New kids on the block Amici forever
have rejected monastic habits in favour of an
altogether more contemporary look.
The world’s first opera band pack a weighty vocal
punch, as their debut album and ‘returns only’
concerts have proved. Their take on ‘Unchained
Melody’ (Senza Catene) and versions of Puccini’s
‘Nessun dorma’, Elgar’s ‘Nimrod’ and Fauré’s
Pavane, for example, underline the musical
freshness and adventurous spirit of Amici’s growing
repertory. They can also hold the stage with all the
glitz and glam of the sexiest pop bands.
Before purist opera buffs cry foul, they’d do well to
mark the words of veteran Gramophone critic John
Steane, who declared that Amici forever “know
what they are doing, and are good at it. The market
researchers have got it right this time. They’re good
– and that is serious. “ The Opera Band is so good
that it has sold well over 200,000 copies in the
UK, and proved a massive hit in New Zealand and
Australia following Amici’s recent tour down under.
The group’s high-octane performances are
founded on a secure platform of classical training
and umpteen years of collective concert hall
and operatic experience. Bass-baritone Nick
Garrett studied at Trinity College of Music, before
appearing in solo roles with English National Opera,
Opera North, the Opéra National de Paris and the
Royal Opera, Covent Garden. He also toured the
world as a member of the Swingle Singers, and has
composed and arranged for Amici forever. His tenor
colleague Geoff Sewell was raised in New Zealand
and studied music at the Boston Conservatory, while
Amici forever’s other tenor, David Habbin, starred
on the West End musical stage before training as an
opera singer at the Royal Northern College of Music
and appearing at the Glyndebourne Festival.
Soprano Jo Appelby, who lists Renée Fleming as
her favourite artist, graduated with honours from
the Royal Northern College of Music, has sung
with the Carl Rosa Opera company and at the
Glyndebourne Festival. Amici forever’s quintet
is completed by South African soprano Tsakane
Valentine, who has sung for presidents Mandela
and Mbeki and Germany’s Chancellor Schröder.
Her operatic roles include Puccini’s Musetta,
the title-role in Gräfin Maritza and Maria in
West Side Story for the prestigious Spier
Opera Festival.
Amici forever begin their 18-date UK national
tour on 31 May with a gig in Aberdeen, followed
by appearances in leading venues throughout
the country.
photo: jmenternational.com
9

vanessa-mae’s debut album
for sony classical
coming this september
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Bryn Terfel
photo: jmenternational.com
Catrin Finch
If only Wales had applied the same level
of passion and pride to their European
Championship play-off that Bryn Terfel
showed when he sang the nation’s anthem
before the game, the Welsh would have
trounced their Russian opponents 10-0.
Those P words are central to Terfel’s artistry,
backed by a voice of pure gold and a
personal determination to communicate
with his audience, whether at the Royal
Opera House, the Millennium Stadium or
the Carnegie Hall.
Bryn’s 2003 got off to an exceptional start
when he was awarded a CBE in the New
Year’s Honours list, gathered momentum with
a series of acclaimed performances, and was
crowned when his album of popular arias and
songs sold over 300,000 copies within a month
of its release. Bryn’s peerless crossover disc
climbed to number six in the UK album chart,
ahead of Rod Stewart, Justin Timberlake and
the Sugababes. The 38-year-old opera singer’s
stay in the pop chart must have been especially
sweet for a man once mistaken on the streets
of Manhattan for Meat Loaf!
“There has been a lot of thought behind
the album, which I worked on for about 18
months,” observes Bryn. “But I never dreamt
I would be in pop charts!”
Music, he adds, has been in the Terfel blood
for generations. His parents own fine voices,
although Bryn’s dad set aside any thoughts of
pursuing singing as a profession in favour of
tending the ancestral farm. Solid family roots
and the monumental landscape of north Wales
have helped Bryn keep his sense of perspective
during his rise to superstar status. A natural gift
for singing meant that the lad from Pant Glas
was able to refine his vocal skills as a student at
London’s Guildhall School of Music and Drama.
He went on to capture audience hearts and
the minds of opera casting directors worldwide
when he appeared in the 1989 Cardiff Singer
of the World competition, fighting a valiant
final Battle of the Baritones with the eventual
winner Dmitri Hvorostovsky. The following
year he made his operatic debut with Welsh
National Opera in Mozart’s Così fan tutte and
took the first giant steps on a career path that
swiftly brought him to the Salzburg Festival,
the stages of the Royal Opera House, Covent
Garden, New York’s Metropolitan Opera, and
La Scala, Milan.
In 1993 Bryn signed his first exclusive contract
with Deutsche Grammophon, forging a
relationship that has since flourished to form
an extraordinary, award-rich discography.
His massive contribution as a recording and
performing artist was recognised at the
inaugural Classical BRITs in 2000 when he
received the Male Artist of the Year Award.
Since then, Bryn has applied his winning ways
to the business of arts promotion, establishing
the Faenol Festival near his home in north
Wales as a platform for local people to hear
the likes of José Carerras, Hayley Westenra,
Martine McCutcheon and Elaine Paige.
Tara’s halls and the court of King David may
have echoed to the harp’s beguiling sounds. But
the royal palaces of old surely never enjoyed
artistry to compare with that of Catrin Finch,
whose musicianship and technical certainty
serve to extract an uncanny range of sounds
from her venerable instrument. In fact, the 24-
year-old Welsh performer favours anything but
venerable instruments.
She recently took delivery of a pink, electronic
harp, promptly christened Barbie. “It’s totally
different to the traditional harp,” says Catrin,
“which is static and has foot pedals. It’s much
smaller, uses levers and you can strap it onto
your body and move around as you play, which
is a lot of fun.”
While Catrin’s more traditional black concert
instrument looks less impressive than ornately
carved older (and golder) models, it is blessed
with the latest advances in harp research and
development, making it the Formula 1 Ferrari of
the harp world. “It has always been difficult for
the harp to find its place as a solo instrument,”
she observes. “Only recently – in the last 20
years, really – has there been a place for it on
the recital stage.” That place owes much to the
work of Marisa Robles, who captivated the fiveyear-old
Catrin’s attention when her parents took
her to Lampeter Music Club to hear the thrilling
Spanish-born player in recital. In 1988 young
Catrin began harp lessons with Elinor Bennett,
another pioneer of modern harp playing and one
of Britain’s finest teachers of the instrument.
From 1990 until 1996 Catrin served as harpist in
the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain;
she also appeared twice on BBC television’s Blue
Peter show and won top prizes in the World Harp
Festival in 1991 and 1994. At the age of 16 she
moved to the Purcell School in London, to study
with Skaila Kanga, and subsequently enrolled
at the Royal Academy of Music, where she
graduated in 2002. She made her Wigmore Hall
debut in 2000 and was also awarded the coveted
Young Concert Artists (New York) prize, which
included debut recital engagements in New York,
Boston and Washington.
Catrin’s prodigious talents were recognised by
the Prince of Wales, who invited her to entertain
guests at his 50th birthday party in 1998. Prince
Charles was so impressed by what he heard that
he revived the ancient office of royal harpist
especially for her. The royal post, which she
relinquishes in July, has opened many doors
for Catrin, adding to the reach of her extensive
education work at home and overseas and
supporting her mission to broaden the popular
appeal of classical music.
Last year Catrin’s debut album, Crossing
the Stone, appeared on Sony Classical. Her
forthcoming second disc, The Harpist, includes
sensational performances of Saint-Saëns’ Fantasy
for violin and harp, played in partnership with
Classical BRIT Award winner Chloë Hanslip, and
William Mathias’ Santa Fe Suite.
11

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Katherine Jenkins
photo: jmenternational.com
Time was when classical music brought comfort
to a select group of devotees, characters eager
to preserve the exclusive nature of their passion
and ever-ready to confound newcomers with
talk of truncated recapitulations, flattened
sixths and acciaccaturas.
At 23 Katherine Jenkins is almost too young to recall
those elitist days and undoubtedly determined to
share her powerful mezzo-soprano voice with the
largest audience possible. Her mission to bring the
classics to the masses took a mighty step forward
with the release last month of Premiere, Katherine’s
first album for Universal Classics and Jazz with
Universal Classics and Jazz.
The young Welsh artist’s popular appeal runs more
than voice deep, backed by her film star looks,
a refreshingly honest approach to journalists’
questions, and a genuine desire to communicate
with audiences. “Of course I want to be respected
by classical lovers,” says Katherine. “But I also
want to reach out to some new people.” She cites
song arrangements of Bach’s so-called ‘Air on a G
String’ and Satie’s Gymnopédie No.1 as evidence
of her new album’s enticing repertory mix, works
known to millions thanks to their use in television
commercials and film soundtracks. “I’m hoping
people are going to recognise the tunes and love
the new twist we’ve given to them.”
Premiere also contains such traditional Welsh
favourites as Cwm Rhondda and Ar Lan y Mor,
alongside John Rutter’s exquisite setting of The Lord
is My Shepherd, early Italian songs and Handel’s
haunting ‘Lascia ch’io pianga (aka the Harrods ad
theme music).
Katherine has been singing since she joined her
local church choir in Neath at the age of seven.
Thanks to the support of her mother, a breast
cancer nurse, and her late father, she continued
her musical studies and graduated to membership
of the National Youth Choir of Wales. The teenage
songstress was twice voted Welsh Choirgirl of the
Year. It was in 1998, during a gig in Swansea’s
Brangwyn Hall, that Katherine pitched a perfectly
focused note and shattered a crystal chandelier,
the stuff of every soprano’s dreams.
Following the death of her father eight years
ago, Katherine decided to go all out to become
a singer. She won a scholarship to study at
the Royal Academy of Music in 1997. “I can
still remember screaming when I opened the
acceptance letter!” she recalls. After graduating
in 2000, Katherine was named the Face of Wales
and became official mascot of the Welsh rugby
team, leading the singing at Cardiff’s Millennium
Stadium and recording their World Cup anthem
Bread of Heaven last year.
The Choir of King’s
College, Cambridge
Every Christmas Eve, millions worldwide set
turkey stuffing and plum pudding dressing
aside to tune-in to an unmissable live
broadcast from King’s College, Cambridge.
A lone boy’s voice gently emerges from the
airwaves to sing the opening of Once in Royal
David’s City, joined by his fellow choristers as
they process the length of their ‘home’ in Henry
VI’s majestic collegiate chapel. The following
mix of readings and carols old and new strikes
a perfect balance between contemplation and
celebration, marking the start of Christmas
proper for all those exhausted by the season’s
commercial trappings.
The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, has
performed its annual Festival of Nine Lessons
and Carols since 1918, establishing a 75-year
tradition that has survived unbroken by
wartime threats and unchanged by peacetime
shifts of fashion. But the daily work of these
King’s singers stretches back way beyond the
early 20th century to a day in late summer
1446 when Henry VI laid the foundation stone
for his new college in Cambridge. The King’s
College, sister to Henry’s other educational
enterprise at Eton, has maintained a choir
from its earliest times. Today it numbers
sixteen choristers, educated at nearby
King’s School, and fourteen choral scholars,
undergraduate students within the college.
King’s also supports two undergraduate organ
scholars, many of whom have progressed to
become top professional musicians.
In addition to singing daily Evensong
during term time, the King’s choir flexes
its collective musical might in concert, on
tour and on record. The vast King’s College
discography has been boosted since Stephen
Cleobury arrived as the choir’s director
of music in 1982 with a string of typically
adventurous recordings for EMI Classics,
exploring everything from the music of
Johann Sebastian Bach in the company of
Classical BRIT Award winner Ian Bostridge to
Rachmaninov’s Vespers and, most recently,
Divine Liturgy. The choir has commissioned
new pieces from John Tavener, Arvo Pärt,
Thomas Adès, John Rutter, Harrison Birtwistle
and Peter Maxwell Davies, among other
leading contemporary classical composers,
recording many of them and generally
expanding the repertory of sacred music. The
Choir’s Rachmaninov Vespers recording won
the Ensemble/Orchestral Album of the Year
Award at the first Classical BRITs in 2000.
Stephen Cleobury says that when he auditions
choristers he’s on the look out for boys with “a
bit of spark in them … a bright personality”.
Above all, he wants singers who can “get down
to things, roll their sleeves up and do a job”.
King’s College continues to provide one of the
finest of all educations for its choristers, turning
eager youngsters into seasoned musicians and
thoroughly decent chaps.
13

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An Evening at The BRIT School
John Craig, Governor of the BRIT School and
Chairman of the BRIT Trust with the cast of Into the
Woods by Stephen Sondheim. The students are Year
13 studying Musical Theatre. The production was
their final major project which forms part of their
BTEC qualification in Performing Arts.
photo: Chris Lewington
The BRIT School
Freddie Smith aged 16yrs
“ Coming to the BRIT School has
enabled me to work with different
musicians and has enhanced my
performance skills.”
Freddie was introduced to the violin in
1995 as part of a primary school music
scheme and showed enough aptitude
for the music master to suggest regular
classical violin lessons. From winning
a music scholarship in 1997, Freddie’s
musical career has flourished from
reaching the finals of the National Music
for Youth Festival in July 2000 to actually
winning the Traditional and International
category in 2002. In May 2001, Freddie
has accompanied Graham Lyle (Gallagher
& Lyle), ‘Rock, Salt and Nails’ and many
famous names in Irish music. Despite his
fondness for Celtic music, Freddie has
continued with his classical studies.
The BRIT School has been in existence for just
12 years, created out of a unique partnership
between the Government and the British
Record Industry Trust. It is still Britain’s only
free Performing Arts & Technology School for
14 to 19 year olds.
Fourteen year olds are admitted on the basis of
their commitment to a broad curriculum and
potential in their chosen arts area. At the School
music students broaden their knowledge of classic
and contemporary works. By widening their
appreciation, the students can understand the value
of classical music and become more versatile in
their approach to contempoary compositions.
The picture at post-l6 focuses much more on the
students’ own strand, with most of the curriculum
time spent in one area – a choice of music, dance,
media, theatre and production, art and design, and
musical theatre.
As part of this year’s musical theatre option
at the BRIT School, students have performed
Girlfriends by Howard Goodall, Godspell by
Stephen Schwartz and Into The Woods by
Stephen Sondheim. The shows are designed
to give students an opportunity to form their
own performance companies and contemplate
the demands of marketing, sponsorship and
community outreach. Each student takes on a
company role. In some cases, this will involve
considerable artistic input. The shows are
supported by production students. They design
and build sets, operate sound and lights and work
as a fully independent stage management crew.
Each show is seen by an audience of 200 for three
performances. There are also matinees and other
events targeted to local communities.
Also during the year Musical Theatre students
perform a number of showcases highlighting the
work they have been doing on their course. On
10th June, for example, there will be An Evening of
Sondheim and Schwartz – a contemporary dance
and drama event – performed by Year 12 musical
theatre students. If you would like to attend the
evening, please contact the Box Office at the BRIT
School on 020 8665 5242.
Supporting young people in music and education
If you would like further information on the
BRIT School, please contact Arthur Boulton on
020 8665 5242 or www.brit.croydon.sch.uk
or the BRIT Trust www.brittrust.co.uk please
contact Maggie Crowe on 020 7803 1302.
15

In the beginning...
It all started with the mighty blast of
fireworks and a pulsating performance
from Vanessa-Mae, who rocked the Royal
Albert Hall with her Toccata and Fugue to
set the inaugural Classical BRIT Awards
off in thrilling fashion. Charlotte Church,
Lesley Garrett, Julian Lloyd Weber and
Kennedy also took to the stage on that
momentous night in May 2000, while Bryn
Terfel arrived at the party by helicopter to
collect the first Male Artist of the
Year Award.
In the spirit of millennium year makeovers,
Classical BRIT founder Rob Dickins saw to it
that the growing public appetite for classical
music was celebrated with a glamorous
new award show. The birth of the Classical
BRITs coincided with news of recordbreaking
listening figures from Classic FM
and the chart-topping success of Charlotte
Church and Andrea Bocelli. Core classical
values were also high on the Classical BRIT
agenda, reflected in 2000 with awards to the
mercurial Argentine pianist Marta Argerich,
fast-rising young British conductor Daniel
Harding, tenor Ian Bostridge, and the Choir
of King’s College. Cambridge.
A few Classical BRIT facts a figures help
underline why the Awards show has
become one of the most significant events
Sir Simon Rattle – 2001 Nigel Kennedy – 2000
Bond – 2003
16

Bryn Terfel & Andrea Bocelli – 2003 (above)
Magdelena Kozena – 2002
photo: jmenternational.com
in the UK’s classical music calendar.
In 2001 sales of albums by Award winners
went up by 344% after the show broadcast,
while those who performed saw a 436%
increase in their album sales. The entire
Classical market grew by 61% as a direct
result of the television show. Last year, the
impact on the sales of those performing
was even greater, up by 658% on the
pre-show figures.
The television broadcast of the first Classical
BRIT Awards drew over five million viewers,
many of them complete newcomers to
classical music. “The idea of the Classical
BRITs is to use the populism of certain
classical performers to lead people towards
unfamiliar artists and repertoire,” observed
Rob Dickins at the time. Performances at
subsequent Awards by ‘People’s Tenor’
Russell Watson, the OperaBabes, Andrea
Bocelli and all-girl string quartet Bond have
helped keep viewing figures high.
Outstanding mainstream artists have also
contributed to the huge popular appeal of
the Classical BRITs, an event that can credit
performances from international opera stars
Angela Gheorghiu, Bryn Terfel and Cecilia
Bartoli, such charismatic fiddlers as Maxim
Vengerov and Nigel Kennedy, brilliant
young talents such as Chloë Hanslip and
Magdalena Kozena, and the inspirational
Sir Simon Rattle.
17

18

The Launch
Vannesa Mae
Lisa Anderson, Rob Dickins, Katie Derham & Alan Cook (CEO NS&I)
Television cameras, an army of journalists
and the great and the good of the
classical music industry made their way
to London’s Landmark Hotel at the end
of April to hear news of the fifth Classical
BRIT Awards.
The Landmark provided the aptly titled
venue to announce a genuine milestone for
an event that sprang to life fully formed in
2000 and has since gone from strength to
strength. It also offered a platform for foottapping
performances from Welsh songbird
Katherine Jenkins, setting pulses racing
with her sultry delivery of the Habanera
from Bizet’s Carmen, and from Vanessa-
Mae, unveiling ‘Bash Street Bach’ from her
forthcoming album, Dances with Time.
Classical BRIT founder and chairman Rob
Dickins spoke with pride as he told all
assembled in the hotel’s Music Room of the
massive contribution made by the Awards
to the growth in classical music’s popular
appeal. “It continues to show the amazing
range of artists performing today,”
he observed.
News of artists appearing in this year’s show
was delivered in the unmistakeable tones of
ITN’s Katie Derham, about to present the
Classical BRIT Awards for the fourth time.
“What an honour!,” she said. “Every year
it seems to grow in stature, with fabulous
stars and incredible performances. It’s a
wonderful evening to be part of, and a
great show to watch. I can’t wait.”
Katie joked about her changing onscreen
hairstyles as she introduced a short video
presentation of Classical BRIT history, which
caught the full power and the unrestrained
passion of performances by Nigel Kennedy,
Maxim Vengerov, Caroline Dale, Cecilia
Bartoli, Vanessa-Mae, Bond, the duo
partnership that raised the roof at last year’s
show of Bryn Terfel and Andrea Bocelli, and
a host of classical talent.
Katie Derham’s fellow Classic FM
presenter, Simon Bates, thanked those
“very nice people” at National Savings
and Investments for supporting this year’s
Classical BRIT Awards. He then announced
the list of nominees for the Album of the
Year Award, confessing in the process that
he had not yet washed the hand he used to
meet and greet Myleene Klass at last
year’s show!
19

NOMINATIONS FOR THE
CLASSICAL BRITS
Young British
Classical Performer
Colin Currie
Striking a Balance:
A Percussion Recital
Critics Award
Maxim Vengerov
Britten/Walton
Violin Concertos
Male Artist of the Year
Nigel Kennedy
The Vivaldi Album
572 2672 557 5102 557 6482

2004
Ensemble/Orchestral
Album of the Year
Simon Rattle/VPO
Beethoven Symphonies
Album of the Year
Lesley Garrett
So Deep is the Night
Album of the Year
Denise Leigh
Jane Gilchrist
Operatunity
557 4452
557 6282 557 5942
For further information regarding these artists, please visit our website www.emiclassics.com

Female Artist of the Year
Last year, Cecilia Bartoli left the Classical
BRITs with the Outstanding Contribution to
Music Award and a host of new fans. She’s on
the nomination shortlist for top female artist
this time round, voted there by members
of the Classical BRIT Academy for the
stunning strength of her artistry and absolute
commitment to neglected masterpieces. Bartoli
brings us closer to the real Antonio Salieri in
her latest album, revealing the misunderstood
composer’s flare for onstage drama. The great
British public immediately took Hayley Westenra
to their hearts, buying her debut album Pure
by the truckload. This down-to-earth diva
has managed to find time to study for her
GCSEs while touring the planet to perform
everywhere from the Sydney Opera to Carnegie
Hall. Conductor Marin Alsop’s work has also
won admirers around the globe, prompting
sagacious commentators to predict that she will
become the first woman music director of one
of the world’s top symphony orchestras.
Previous Winners
2003: Renee Fleming
2002: Cecilia Bartoli
2001: Angela Gheorghiu
2000: Martha Argerich
Introduced by Katie
Derham, who presents
two hours of the
greatest Classic FM
Music every Saturday
afternoon at 2pm.
Marin Alsop
In 2002 Marin Alsop became the first
female principal conductor of a leading
British symphony orchestra. Her work with
the Bournemouth Symphony has attracted
international attention, backed by rave
reviews for their thrilling first recording for
Naxos and a string of critical superlatives
for concert performances. The daughter
of professional musicians, young Marin set
aside her sticklebricks at the age of two in
favour of piano lessons. Three years later
she began violin classes and went on to
study fiddle at Harvard and the Juilliard
School of Music. In 1988 she studied with
the legendary American conductor Leonard
Bernstein at Tanglewood and made her
London debut with the LSO at the Barbican.
Alsop’s progress since has been meteoric,
blasting her through the glass ceiling
routinely placed above women conductors.
She has worked with many of the world’s
leading orchestras, the Chicago Symphony
and Bavarian Radio Symphony among them,
and most recently conducted the New York
Philharmonic in concert performances of
Bernstein’s Candide.
Cecilia Bartoli
If great singing is all about communication,
then Cecilia Bartoli stands out as one
of the most eloquent, spell-binding and
impassioned artists in the world of classical
music. She captivated the audience at last
year’s Classical BRITs with a sensational
performance of an opera aria by Vivaldi,
a typically daring choice that showed off
her uncanny technical skills alongside the
sheer joy of music making the Bartoli way.
Young Cecilia’s talents were developed
by her mother, also an accomplished
singer, and introduced to the Italian public
on the primetime television talent show
Fantastico. Since making her first disc for
Decca in 1988, she has gone on to become
a true star of the opera stage and concert
hall. Her album of rarely heard Vivaldi
has sold more than half a million copies,
tribute to the magical power of Bartoli’s
extraordinary singing. Last year she helped
rehabilitate the music of Antonio Salieri
in yet another groundbreaking album of
Italian opera arias.
Hayley Westenra
The audience at last year’s Classical BRITs
show was introduced to a 16-year-old
soprano from New Zealand, who charmed
a packed Royal Albert Hall with her
performance of the traditional Maori song
Pokarekare ana. Few people in the UK had
heard of the young singer then. They have
now! Hayley Westenra’s debut album Pure
proved a phenomenal success following
its launch last September. The disc was
officially recognised as the fastest-selling
debut album in the history of the UK
classical charts, instantly capturing the No.1
slot. It also leapt to No.8 in the pop charts
within the first week of release and went
on to become the biggest selling classical
album of 2003. Hayley, who celebrated her
17th birthday on 10 April, recently returned
to Britain from an extensive promotional
tour of the United States. No surprises,
then, that Pure has stormed the Billboard
crossover charts in the US to boost the
album’s 1.2 million worldwide sales.
www.marinalsop.com
Listen to: Chichester Psalms,
etc – inspired conducting
from Marin Alsop brings
Lenny Bernstein’s music to
unrestrained life.
(Naxos 8.559177)
www.ceciliabartolionline.com
Listen to: The Salieri Album
– spine-tingling displays of
virtuosity and irrepressible
emotions from Bartoli at
her best.
(Decca 475 100-2)
www.hayleywestenra.com
Listen to: Pure – charm, bright
hope and amazing grace flow
from Hayley’s chart-topping
UK debut disc.
(Decca 475 330-2)
23

CONGRATULATIONS
ON YOUR
NOMINATION FOR
ALBUM OF THE YEAR
amiciforever.com

Male Artist of the Year
When it comes to the art of performance,
each of tonight’s trio of great musicians
shares a common loathing of the routine,
dull and superficial. They are among
that rare breed of artists blessed with
the X-factor, the alchemical ingredient
necessary to cast fresh light onto even the
most familiar of works. Sir Colin Davis’s
incandescent recent recordings with the
London Symphony Orchestra fall into the
Indian summer category associated with
such legendary names from the past as
Bruno Walter and Otto Klemperer. The
word ‘revelatory’ stood out in reviews of his
recently released Sibelius disc. It was also
applied last year by the critics to Kennedy’s
latest thoughts on Vivaldi’s greatest hit,
The Four Seasons. Meanwhile, Bryn Terfel
revealed just how cool opera singing can
be by reaching an audience far beyond the
stalls of Covent Garden and La Scala.
Previous Winners
2003: Sir Simon Rattle
2002: Sir Colin Davis
2001: Kennedy
2000: Bryn Terfel
Introduced by Lesley
Garrett, who presents
two hours of her
favourite music every
Sunday afternoon on
Classic FM at 2pm.
Sir Colin Davis
Nigel Kennedy
Bryn Terfel
With just a few days to go before the
London Symphony Orchestra celebrates
its centenary with a star-packed gala
concert at the Barbican Centre, it’s fitting
that the band’s principal conductor
should be in line for a coveted Classical
BRIT Award. His emotionally searing
interpretation of Berlioz’s monumental
opera Les Troyens (‘The Trojans’) walked
away with two Grammy Awards in 2002,
while his performance of the same work
with the LSO at last year’s Proms was one
of the most praised events of the season.
Sir Colin’s blend of youthful energy and
sagacious musical wisdom was again
turned to winning effect earlier this year
with performances of Britten’s Peter Grimes
in London and New York, eliciting critical
superlatives on both sides of the Atlantic.
He has also been lauded for his recent
recordings on the LSO Live label, including
a no-holds-barred account of Holst’s
The Planets, a revelatory reading of
Bruckner’s sublime Ninth Symphony, and
a compelling coupling of Sibelius’ Third
and Seventh Symphonies.
Kennedy’s dazzling virtuosity and profound
musicianship have touched millions around
the globe, challenging ingrained prejudice
against the classics and smashing down
barriers between different types of music.
His first recording of Vivaldi’s The Four
Seasons, which sold well over two million
copies, secured an entry in the Guinness
Book of Records as the best-selling
classical album ever released and scored a
BRIT Award. Last year, Kennedy revisited
the Red Priest’s greatest hit for EMI
Classics in company with members of the
Berliner Philharmoniker. The partnership
created a critically-acclaimed interpretation
full of fresh insights and marked by its
amazing spirit of freedom. There’s no lack
of insight or musical freedom in Kennedy’s
other 2003 release East Meets West.
Here Kennedy teams up with Polish band
Kroke to dig deep into the musical soul
of Eastern Europe and add his own spirit
to the mix, once again confounding those
who like to place musicians into neatly
labelled categories.
Perhaps we should spare the big man’s
blushes. But the Financial Times firmly hit
the nail head on when it described Bryn
Terfel as having ‘the agility of a wrestler
and the sexual charisma of a rock star’. It
should also be said that the Welsh bassbaritone
owns one of the most beautiful
voices ever to grace the operatic stage.
In short, he’s a singer in a million. Last
year he was awarded a CBE for services to
music, brought the Classical BRITs show
to a rousing close in duet with Andrea
Bocelli, and saw his latest album, Bryn, leap
high into the pop chart. Bryn’s passionate
approach to singing and down-to-earth
nature were memorably explored in
Alan Yentob’s Imagine documentary, a
primetime BBC1 show that introduced
opera and classical music to countless
viewers usually resistant to both. Next year
Terfel makes his long-awaited stage debut
as Wotan in Wagner’s Ring cycle at the
Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.
www.lsc.org.uk
Listen to: Sibelius Symphonies
Nos. 3 & 7 – spiritually
charged interpretations from
Sir Colin and top-drawer
Sibelius playing from
his orchestra.
(LSO Live LSO0051)
www.nigelkennedy.com
Listen to: Vivaldi The
Four Seasons – historical
performance style meets
thoroughly modern virtuosity
for Kennedy’s Vivaldi fest with
the Berlin Phil.
(EMI Classics 5 57648 2)
www.terfel.com
Listen to: Bryn – every drop
of Terfel’s artistry is lavished
on this collection of popular
arias, hymns and songs.
(Deutsche Grammophon
474 703-2)
25

The National Savings and Investments Album of the Year
The battle of the votes got underway
at the end of April, allowing the people
to decide in favour of the year’s top
classical album. Who is it going to be
this year? Former winners Andrea Bocelli
and Russell Watson are not in contention
this time round, leaving the way clear
perhaps for another chart-topping singer.
New kid on the block Hayley Westenra
is likely to be top tip with the bookies,
although Bryn Terfel, Lesley Garrett,
Aled Jones and ‘Lucky’ Luciano Pavarotti
have all got to be worth a flutter. And
then there are Operatunity winners,
Jane Gilchrist and Denise Leigh, proof
positive that the determined can follow
their dreams come what may. Other
newcomers to this coveted Classical
BRIT category include Amici forever,
Sting’s right-hand man Dominic Miller,
and gorgeous Mylene Klass. There’s no
hearsay to give the game away tonight.
It’s all down to the power of the Classic
FM listeners’ poll.
Aled Jones
Higher UCJ
By any measure, it’s been a fantastic year
for Jones the Voice. His second album for
Universal Classics and Jazz topped the
classical chart, millions watched him present
BBC Songs of Praise, and yet more tuned
in to his unmissable Sunday Breakfast slot
on Classic FM. Aled’s instantly recognisable
baritone rings out songs of faith and praise
in Higher, including classic hymns and
modern sacred hits cannily arranged and
produced by Robert Prizeman. He also
does the business in a cover version of the
old Sal Solo hit San Damiano. “I feel happy
doing this sort of music. It’s what I’ve always
done,” he says.
www.aledjones.co.uk
Bryn Terfel
Bryn Deutsche Grammophon
Even lemon-sucking critics with a genetic
aversion to classical crossover albums must
raise three cheers for Bryn. The world’s preeminent
bass-baritone, a man with no time
for musical snobs, turned his supreme voice
to serve a programme of classic tunes for his
latest chart-topping Deutsche Grammophon
release. He delivers If I can help somebody
with all the force and passion of a Verdi aria,
shows his pure operatic pedigree with a
thrilling account of the Toreador Song from
Bizet’s Carmen, and tugs at the heartstrings
with producer Chris Hazell’s sensitive
arrangements of Shenandoah, Danny Boy
and Home Sweet Home.
www.terfel.com
Previous Winners
2003: Andrea Bocelli “Sentimento”
2002: Russell Watson “Encore”
2001: Russell Watson “The Voice”
2000: Andrea Bocelli “Sacred Arias”
Introduced by Simon
Bates, who can be
heard every weekday
morning on Classic
FM between 7am
and 11am. He also
presents the best
film soundtracks
every Saturday
evening from
6pm until 8pm.
Amici forever
The Opera Band Arista
The ‘world’s first opera band’ caught the
popular imagination following the release of
their debut album last September, helped
by the stunning good looks and classicallytrained
voices of the group’s three male
and two female singers. Amici forever laid
the ground for their success by supporting
Shirley Bassey during her UK arena tour,
inspiring standing ovations night after night.
They enlisted the tried and trusted team
of producer Nick Patrick (responsible for
Russell Watson’s debut disc) and arranger
Nick Ingman to work on The Opera Band.
The resulting mix of great opera arias and
arrangements earned Amici the nickname
of ‘The Fleetwood Mac of Opera’.
www.amiciforever.com
Denise Leigh & Jane Gilchrist
Operatunity EMI Classics
Reality telly may have had its day. And
yet Channel 4’s inspirational Operatunity
proved the format could still captivate
viewers. It also set habitually cynical
journos free to unleash a flood of positive
superlatives. The Operatunity cameras
followed the progress of over 2000 amateur
musicians as they competed for the chance
to sing in a production at English National
Opera. Denise Leigh and Jane Gilchrist
emerged triumphant to record an album
for EMI Classics under the baton of ENO’s
music director Paul Daniel. “Operatunity
completely changed my life! I’ve always
longed to sing professionally and I’m
now living my dream,” says former Tesco
checkout assistant Jane Gilchrist.
www.deniseleigh.com & www.janegilchrist.com
26

Dominic Miller
Shapes BBC Music
Born and bred in Argentina and raised in
the United States, Dominic Miller honed his
guitar playing to perfection with studies at
London’s Guildhall School of Music, where
his college chums included Nigel Kennedy
and Level 42 keyboard player Mike Lindup.
Dominic has worked on every Sting album
and tour since his first collaboration with
the singer in 1991. They teamed up again at
last year’s Classical BRITs to preview a track
from Shapes, Dominic’s evocative take on
popular classics by Bach, Beethoven, Elgar,
Albinoni and others. The album topped the
UK classical charts last spring and has just
been released internationally.
www.dominicmiller.com
Lesley Garrett
So Deep is the Night EMI Classics
In the quarter century since she won the
coveted Kathleen Ferrier Award, Lesley
Garrett has become firmly established as
the nation’s favourite soprano. Along the
way, she has starred in acclaimed opera
productions at home and overseas, hosted
her own series on BBC2 and Classic FM, and
fought a winning battle to deliver classical
music to the widest possible audience. Last
week we saw her in action among other
celebs, tripping the light fantastic in Strictly
Come Dancing. Lesley tapped into her rich
classical roots for So Deep is the Night,
performing everything from Purcell and
Pergolesi to Falla and Fauré.
www.lesleygarrett.co.uk
Ludovico Einaudi
Echoes – The Collection BMG
Elegant simplicity is the name of Ludovico
Einaudi’s musical game. His albums have
struck a sympathetic chord with British
audiences, thanks not least to the massively
popular appeal of Classic FM airplay. It’s all
a far step from his days as assistant to fellow
Italian composer and top avant-gardist
Luciano Berio. The 55-year-old Einaudi,
however, has retained the clarity and lyrical
flow of his mentor’s finest work, distilling
melodies down to their bare essentials
and clothing them with gentle harmonies.
Echoes recalls 14 of the composer’s best
tracks and introduces three new pieces
recorded live in London last July.
www.ludovicoeinaudi.com
Hayley Westenra
Pure Decca
From pre-teen days busking back home in
New Zealand’s Christchurch to becoming
star of the fastest-selling debut album in the
history of the UK classical charts, it’s clear
that Hayley Westenra is destiny’s child. The
17-year-old soprano has already sung to
HM the Queen, debuted at Carnegie Hall
and shared the stage with Bryn Terfel and
José Carreras. Hayley’s debut album, Pure,
entered the British classical charts at No.1
last autumn, reached the Top 10 in the pop
charts and has gone on to sell over one
million copies worldwide.
www.hayleywestenra.com
Luciano Pavarotti
Ti Adoro Decca
Beware all imitations! Pavarotti is still the
main tenor man in the business, adding a
notable first album of Italian pop songs to
his huge Decca discography last autumn
and demonstrating that he’s lost none of
his old magic. The 68-year-old superstar
recently bid farewell to the stage of the
Metropolitan Opera in New York, scene of
some of his most triumphant performances
since making his debut there in 1968.
Ti Adoro (‘I adore you’) could well have
been the phrase on everyone’s lips at the
Met for Pavarotti’s final opera performance.
www.lucianopavarotti.com
Myleene Klass
Moving On UCJ
“It doesn’t have to be all about people in
tuxedoes and bad hair, and people that
look like your Geography teacher,” says
Myleene about classical music. The former
Hear’Say member adds that she’s on a
mission to win converts, young and not so
young, to the classics. It helped influence
her decision to sign a with Universal
Classics and Jazz, which in turn allowed the
25-year-old keyboard player to return to
her classical roots for Moving On. Bach and
Beethoven rub shoulders here with Daniel
Bedingfield and Linkin’ Park.
www.myleeneklass.co.uk
27

Ensemble/Orchestral Album of the Year
The breadth of tastes in classical music and
the remarkable expertise of British artists are
celebrated in the choice of albums shortlisted
for this award. John Rutter’s fine ear for a
memorable melody is underpinned by his
inimitable knack for finding spot-on harmonies
to match and his flair for orchestration. The
Cambridge-based composer’s choral works can
be heard wherever English is sung; Distant Land
offers a chance to discover Rutter’s orchestral
soundscape. Oxford’s dreaming spires and
college chapels have also contributed to the
richness and diversity of the nation’s choral
tradition. Last year Edward Higginbottom and
his New College choristers reminded listeners
of the religious, faith-based message of Bach’s
St John Passion by articulating every word of
the text in their Naxos recording. Sir Simon
Rattle, meanwhile, highlighted the revolutionary
force of Beethoven’s symphonies in strikingly
individual recorded performances with the
Vienna Philharmonic.
Previous Winners
Introduced by Aled
Jones, who presents
Classic FM Breakfast
every Sunday morning
from 7am until 9am.
2003: Berliner Philharmoniker/Rattle “Mahler, Symphony no. 5”
2002: LSO/Hickox “Vaughan Williams, A London Symphony”
2001: Berliner Philharmoniker/Rattle “Mahler, Symphony no 10”
2000: The Choir Of Kings College Cambridge,
Stephen Cleobury “Rachmaninov’s Vespers”
Sir Simon Rattle/VPO
Beethoven Symphonies – EMI Classics
To say that Sir Simon Rattle’s complete
set of the Beethoven symphonies ranks
as an important achievement would be a
massive understatement in the context of
the modern classical recording business.
These very special performances, caught
live in 2002 at Vienna’s Musikvereinsaal,
draw deep on the peerless Beethoven
traditions of the Vienna Philharmonic.
They also project a fearless element of
spontaneity from the conductor, who
balances ideas informed by profound
knowledge of period style with the flexible,
overtly romantic approach of such inspired
past interpreters as Wilhelm Furtwängler
and Otto Klemperer. Wit, grandeur,
humanity and passion are here in plenty.
Classic FM exclusively broadcast Rattle’s
Beethoven in the week of its release in
March last year, triggering big sales of
the lavishly packaged five-disc set and
adding to the intense media interest in the
conductor’s interpretations. According to
the Independent, the album presented ‘a
crucial test for the future of classical music
recording in this country’, one it has passed
with flying colours.
www.simonrattle.co.uk
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra/Sir Simon Rattle
(EMI Classics 5 57445 2)
New College Choir/Higginbottom
Bach/St John Passion – Naxos
Old boys from New College, legendary
countertenor James Bowman and risingstar
tenor James Gilchrist among them,
made space in their busy diaries to join
the present crop of Oxford choristers
in recording this vivid, dramatic reading
of Johann Sebastian Bach’s first Leipzig
Passion setting. Thanks to Edward
Higginbottom’s wholehearted leadership
over the last 28 years, New College Choir
has flourished as never before since its
foundation in 1379. Together they have
made a stack of records, including the
chart-topping Agnus Dei albums for Erato
and a host of discs of music by Renaissance
and Baroque composers never recorded
before. The choir’s boy trebles won the
hearts of everyone who saw the 2001
Classical BRITs television broadcast, dressed
in their bright red surplices and performing
Barber’s haunting Agnus Dei like priceless
little angels. When it comes to Bach’s
Passion, the whole choir is on top form and
totally committed to getting the words and
their powerful religious message across.
www.newcollegechoir.co.uk
Choir of New College, Oxford/Edward Higginbottom
(Naxos 8.557296-97)
John Rutter/RPO
Distant Land – Universal/Universal Classics
Rare among composers of the immediate
post-war generation, John Rutter chose
not to mirror the 20th century’s destruction
and misery in his music. Optimism and
joy are central Rutterian themes, tinged
occasionally with nostalgia and always with
a desire to communicate. “I happen not
to believe in erecting needless barriers
between composer and listener,” he says.
Rutter has kept faith with the musical
language favoured by his teachers at
Highgate School (where his classmates
included one John Tavener) and Cambridge
University. During the late 1960s and 1970s,
he crafted some of the most memorable
and charming choral miniatures ever
created. His work has flourished in more
recent decades with the completion of a
heartfelt setting of the Requiem and other
substantial compositions. Distant Land, the
first ever album entirely devoted to Rutter’s
orchestral pieces, draws deep on his
catalogue of choral pieces. The title track
began life as A Song of Freedom, originally
conceived for choir to mark Nelson
Mandela’s release from prison.
www.rpo.co.uk
Royal Philharmonic Orchestra/John Rutter
(Universal Classics UCJ 476 124-2)
28

Critics’ Award
It took some time before those puffs of
white smoke were sent up from the critics’
conclave this year. But the ultimate choice
of winner drew a reassuring consensus from
all concerned, while few blows were traded
in the battle to select two other shortlist
candidates from the bumper catalogue of
eligible recordings. The decision came down
in favour of three orchestral albums, despite
stiff competition from discs of chamber music,
song and early music. Once again, the London
Symphony Orchestra figured prominently at
the lunch-table debate, just as it did last year
and in 2002, when our critics unanimously
voted in favour of Sir Colin Davis’s LSO Live
recording of Les Troyens (‘The Trojans’).
Vienna’s finest also claimed a place in the
final frame, in company with Sir Simon Rattle.
Visceral thrills, fresh insights, sublime playing
and transcendent artistry are part of the deal in
all three recordings.
Previous Winners
Introduced by Lisa
Duncombe, presenter of
Late Night Lisa on Friday
and Saturday evenings
at 11pm, and one of the
judges in this category.
2003: Murray Perahia “Chopin/Etudes Opus 10, Opus 25”
2002: LSO/Davis “Berlioz, Les Troyens”
2001: Berliner Philharmoniker/Rattle “Mahler, Symphony no 10”
2000: Ian Bostridge, Accompanied By Julius Drake,
“The English Songbook”
Mahler: Symphony No.6
London Symphony Orchestra/Mariss Jansons
Long before the Classical BRITs critics’ panel
met to thrash out their trio of nominations,
the wider critical community had already
lavished praise on Mariss Jansons’
elemental interpretation of Mahler’s Sixth
Symphony. ‘A magical disc’, said Classic
FM Magazine; ‘Superb’ said the Observer.
Gramophone editor James Jolly was
‘absolutely knocked out’ by the white-hot
playing of the London Symphony Orchestra,
a point he made again with conviction over
the roast lamb and spring vegetables at this
year’s critics’ lunch. The charismatic Latvian
conductor etched his vivid interpretation
of the aptly nicknamed ‘Tragic’ Symphony
at two concerts given in the Barbican
Centre in November 2002, performances
captured on the wing by the award-winning
LSO Live label and its expert production
team. There’s nothing predictable or
routine about Jansons’ Mahler. He and the
majestic LSO seize hold of the composer’s
monumental Sixth, extracting every drop
of emotion from the score and responding
with compelling spontaneity to its violent
mood swings.
www.lso.co.uk
London Symphony Orchestra/Mariss Jansons
(LSO Live LSO0038)
Beethoven: Symphonies Nos. 1-9
Vienna Philharmonic/Sir Simon Rattle
Every generation needs its defining
interpretations of the great classics, and
ours was certainly eager to hear the
recorded thoughts of Sir Simon Rattle on
Beethoven’s Symphonies. The conductor
made his first complete set of the works in
the Austrian capital with the mighty Vienna
Philharmonic, an orchestra formed within 14
years of Beethoven’s death and recognised
for most of its existence as one of the
world’s finest symphonic bands. Critics
have disputed points of interpretation,
made personal comparisons with legendary
recordings from the distant and recent past,
and generally dissected Rattle’s approach
to these keystone works of the classical
repertory. They have also recognised the
vital importance of this release, which
represents a huge vote of confidence in
mainstream classical music by EMI Classics.
“One sees what the recording industry
is going through,” observed Sir Simon.
“I’m thrilled that EMI still have the trust to
do these large things.” So, too, was the
Classical BRITs critics’ panel.
www.simonrattle.co.uk
Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra/Sir Simon Rattle
(EMI Classics 5 57445 2)
Britten Violin & Walton Viola Concertos
Vengerov/Rostropovitch/LSO EMI Classics
When Maxim Vengerov made his UK debut
at the Royal Academy of Music in the late
1980s, few present would have bet against
him becoming a superstar of the violin
world. His debonair performance at last
year’s Classical BRIT Awards confirmed
that he has become one of the great
exponents of his instrument, an artist
able to conjure sounds and effects from
his famous ‘Kreutzer’ Stradivarius with
almost superhuman ease. The 29-yearold
Vengerov’s extrovert musicianship is
matched by a strong sense of adventure in
his choice of repertoire and, for his most
recent disc, of instruments. Accompanied
by his friend and mentor, Mstislav
Rostropovich, and the immaculate London
Symphony Orchestra, the Russian fiddler
reveals his mastery of the viola in his latest
recording for EMI Classics. His performance
of Walton’s bittersweet Viola Concerto
brims over with wit while fully capturing
the work’s sense of pathos. Our critics
universally praised the revelatory musicmaking
displayed here and in Vengerov’s
emotionally unrestrained account of Britten’s
Violin Concerto.
www.emiclassics.com
Maxim Vengerov; LSO/Mstislav Rostropovich
(EMI Classics 5 57510 2)
29

“THE FUTURE OF THE CONTEMPORARY VIOLIN IS SAFE IN HIS HANDS”
BBC MUSIC MAGAZINE
DANIELHOPE
YOUNG BRITISH CLASSICAL PERFORMER OF THE YEAR NOMINATION
"THESE ARE MAGNIFICENT PERFORMANCES,
RECORDED WITH SUPERLATIVE
CLARITY AND PRESENCE, OF TWO GREAT
20TH-CENTURY CONCERTOS."
THE SUNDAY TELEGRAPH
"HIS ACCOUNT OF THE BRITTEN
IS ONE OF THE MOST ENGAGING AND
FLAMBOYANT EVER RECORDED."
SUNDAY TIMES
"THE MOST IMPORTANT
BRITISH STRING PLAYER SINCE
JACQUELINE DU PRE..."
THE BOSTON GLOBE
"SERIOUS, SUBSTANTIAL AND
SPECTACULARLY WELL
PERFORMED."
THE TIMES
DANIELHOPE
BERG * & BRITTEN VIOLIN
CONCERTOS
PAUL WATKINS
BBC SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA
*PREMIERE RECORDING NEW EDITION
2564 60291-2
BERG & BRITTEN VIOLIN CONCERTOS
Marketed and distributed by Warner Classics UK. A division of
Warner Music UK. A Time Warner Company
Warner Music UK Ltd, Warner Classics, Electric Lighting Station,
46 Kensington Court, London, W8 5DA
Tel: 020 7938 5500 Fax: 020 7368 4903
E-mail: ukclassics@warnermusic.com
WarnerClassics

Young British Classical Performer
Not so long ago it was possible for
exceptionally talented young musicians to
develop within an ordered world of playing
opportunities, almost always secluded from
media attention, in which they were judged
against the highest standards set by their elders
and betters. The nominees for tonight’s Award,
however, grew up in an age of instant fame,
where overnight success could be just that.
A glance at the biographies of each artist in
line for the Young British Classical Performer
gives little idea of the sheer graft, the
countless hours of practice, and the setbacks
that confronted them on the way to successful
solo careers. Unlike so many classical musicians
from the past, Catrin Finch, Colin Currie
and Daniel Hope are prepared to roll out
new or neglected repertory and commission
contemporary composers. They jointly share a
conviction that classical music is not just for an
all-too precious few, but belongs to everyone
with ears to hear and emotions to respond.
Previous Winners
2003: Chloë Hanslip
2002: Guy Johnston
2001: Freddy Kempf
2000: Daniel Harding
Introduced by Mark
Goodier, who counts
down the Official
Classic FM Chart every
Saturday morning from
9am to 12 noon.
Catrin Finch
Colin Currie
Daniel Hope
Possession of nimble fingers and a long
grey beard were part of the job description
for the venerable post of Royal Harpist
before HRH the Prince of Wales decided to
revive the office in 2000. Catrin Finch broke
the mould by becoming the first woman to
hold the seal of harpist by appointment,
putting her outstanding technical and
musical talents to the task of attracting new
listeners to her instrument. It comes as no
surprise that the 24-year-old has captured
an army of devoted fans, clearly spellbound
by the vivacious playing of ‘Charlie’s
Angel’. Long service in the National Youth
Orchestra of Great Britain, prize-winning
studies at London’s Royal Academy of
Music, and a string of acclaimed concert
debuts set her career in full motion. Catrin’s
first album for Sony Classical, Crossing
the Stone drew fresh converts to the
harp thanks to its repertory mix of new
compositions by Karl ‘Adiemus’ Jenkins
and savvy arrangements. Her latest Sony
release, The Harpist, confirms Catrin’s status
among the world’s top classical players.
Hats off to Colin Currie’s parents for
encouraging their five-year-old boy to pursue
his youthful passion for percussion. The noisy
years of practice paid off for Edinburgh-born
Colin, who made such swift progress on the
near-limitless range of instruments available
to him that he scooped the coveted Gold
Medal of the Shell/London Symphony
Orchestra Music Scholarship by the age
of 15. Eleven million telly viewers heard
his thrilling account of Errollyn Wallen’s
Concerto for Percussion two years later
when he became the first percussion finalist
in the BBC Young Musician of the Year
competition. Colin continued to open ears to
the vast range of music for his instruments,
while extending the repertory further by
commissioning new concertos from Michael
Torke, Joe Duddell and David Sawer. The
innovative nature of music-making the
Currie way was recognised in 2001 when he
received the Royal Philharmonic Society’s
prestigious Young Artist Award. This is the
second time Colin has been nominated
in the Young British Classical Performer
category at the Classical BRITs.
Some classical artists turn performance
into the art of self-promotion. Others,
Daniel Hope highly placed among them,
prefer to serve composers and their music,
stimulating audiences to experience
profound emotions and think hard about
what they are hearing. The 29-year-old
violinist, voted Classical Performer 2001 by
the London Evening Standard, has chosen
to champion works by living composers and
revisit those by 20th-century figures that
demand to be heard today. Last year he
honoured the memory of his grandmother,
a victim of the Nazi Holocaust, by recording
an album for Nimbus of works by musicians
interred in the notorious Theresienstadt
concentration camp. He also made the
world premiere recording for Warner
Classics of Alban Berg’s Violin Concerto
as intended by its composer, the first in
a series of albums for the label. Daniel
recently became the youngest ever member
of the legendary Beaux Arts Trio, adding
yet another distinction to his heavyweight
list of career achievements.
www.catrinfinch.com
Listen to: Crossing the Stone
- mesmeric playing and totally
assured musicianship are key
to the success of this criticallyacclaimed
debut album.
(Sony Classical 087320)
www.emiclassics.com
Listen to: Striking a Balance
- everything from Bach to
Ravel, Chick Corea to Steve
Reich played with effortless
style and flair.
(EMI Classics CDZ 5 72267 2)
www.danielhope.com
Listen to: Forbidden Music
discover the remarkable
legacy of music written by
Jewish composers murdered
by the Nazis in these
revelatory performances.
(Nimbus NI 5702)
31

PHILIP GLASS Soundtrack to
"THE HOURS" 7559 79693-2
GIDON KREMER
"Happy Birthday" 7559 79657-2
"I heard the music before seeing the
movie and, more than any critical
review, the score alone made me
want to see the film."
Classic FM Magazine.
"...you have to hear it for yourself...
the flashes of wit, the sighs, the zany
juxtapositions, the many seductive shades
and colours [...] and of course there's the
playing, which is consistently first-rate."
Editor's Choice, Gramophone.
Marketed and distributed by Warner Classics
UK, A division of Warner Music UK. A Warner Music Group Company. Warner Music UK Ltd, Warner Classics,
Electric Lighting Station, 46 Kensington Court, London, W8 5DA. Tel: 020 793 5500 Fax: 020 7368 4903 e-mail:ukclassics@warnermusic.com
www.warnerclassics.com
PHILIP GLASS
GIDON
KREMER
CONTEMPORARY MUSIC
AWARD NOMINATIONS

Contemporary Music Award
With talk of the European Union’s enlargement
prompting dancing in the streets of Eastern
Europe just a few weeks back, it’s timely that
the work of a group of musicians from the
Baltic States should be in line for an award for
making a massively positive contribution to
contemporary culture. Gidon Kremer’s Happy
Birthday collection helped celebrate the fifth
anniversary of his Kremerata Baltica ensemble
and also introduced precious little gems by the
likes of Alfred Schnittke, Vato Kakhidze, Lasislav
Kupovic and Peter Heidrich to an open-eared
audience. Once again, Philip Glass brought
modern music to millions with his consummate
soundtrack to Stephen Daldry’s film The
Hours, proving that his brand of minimalism
has lost none of its crystal clear eloquence.
John Rutter’s hugely popular Distant Land
album presents an altogether different strand
in contemporary classical music, one based on
traditional musical values and an unashamed
feeling for lyrical expression.
Previous Winners
Introduced by John
Suchet, who presents
“Composers’ Notes”
on Classic FM every
Saturday evening
at 8pm.
2003: Arvo Part “Orient & Occident”
2002: Tan Dun “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon”
Gidon Kremer: Happy Birthday
Nonesuch/Warner Classics
Philip Glass: The Hours
Nonesuch/Warner Classics
John Rutter: Distant Land
Universal/Universal Classics
What’s the most popular song of all time?
Finding a definitive answer could prove as
difficult as nailing jelly to a barn door. But
one little tune penned by Mildred Hill in the
1890s might well top the chart. Thanks to
Gidon Kremer and his sensational Kremerata
Baltica, Milly Hill’s Happy birthday to you is
dressed up as you’ve never heard it before.
This cracking disc includes a set of Happy
Birthday Variations by Peter Heidrich,
with six of its movements crafted after
the fashion of Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven,
Brahms, Schumann and Dvorak. Irony of the
postmodern variety leaps out of ‘Blitz’ Fantasy
by Georgian composer Vato Kakhidze, while
McMozart’s Eine Kleine Bricht Moonlicht
Nicht Musik restores Professor Teddy Bor to
his rightful place in the stream of classical
music history. Variations on our beloved
national anthem and ‘Auld Lang Syne’, the
bittersweet little Polka by Alfred Schnittke,
and showpieces for Kremer’s virtuoso violin
complete the repertoire mix for Kremerata
Baltica’s fifth birthday present to itself. “Our
intention has always been to awaken the
listener by a kind of shock to the sense, which,
in this case, is a humorous one,” says Kremer.
But for an inspired screenplay, brilliant
acting and directing, and an evocative
Oscar-nominated soundtrack by one of the
world’s leading classical composers, The
Hours would have been chiefly remembered
as the movie in which Nicole Kidman wore
a prosthetic schnozel. Pulitzer Prize-winning
novelist Michael Cunningham says that
the music of Philip Glass has accompanied
and shaped his writing work since the early
1970s, when he chanced to hear a snatch
from the composer’s Einstein on the Beach
on the radio. “The one constant since I
started writing novels – my only ongoing
act of listening fidelity – has been the
work of Philip Glass,” says Cunningham.
The author’s faith was richly repaid in the
soundtrack score of The Hours, which bears
an uncanny power to complement director
Stephen Daldry’s screen images and also
to stand alone as an album. This intensely
focused music, recorded in London with
an outstanding team of British players
conducted by Nick Ingman, genuinely
deserves to be described as haunting.
“I found out a long time ago,” observes
John Rutter, “that if a composer’s music
starts to reach too many people, it pretty
soon gets attacked by those who would
prefer the non-specialist public to be kept
at arm’s length.” The many-striped coat
of contemporary classical music could well
have been woven with Rutter in mind.
The composer’s barrier-free output has
gained a huge and enthusiastic audience
from northern Finland to New Zealand’s
south island, with hero worship part of the
audience deal on his frequent visits to the
United States. The JR Singers in Japan are
devoted exclusively to performances of
Rutter’s work, while his Gloria is a popular
choice of music to relax birthing mothers.
In the closing years of the Soviet regime
in Estonia, his Shepherd’s Pipe Carol was
sung, played and whistled as a signal of
national defiance. Distant Land highlights
the hallmark Rutter virtues of melodic
imagination and compositional craft,
ranging from the folksong-based Suite for
Strings to his Beatles Concerto.
www.gidon-kremer.com
Listen to: Happy Birthday
– musical humour, puns,
affectionate tributes and brica-brac
delivered with panache
by Kremer and his colleagues
from the Baltic States.
www.philipglass.com
Listen to: The Hours – superior
musical minimalism, hypnotic
in effect and spellbinding in
performance.
www.oup.co.uk/music/
repprom/rutter
Listen to: Distant Land – cast
aside your cares and woes
in the company of the Royal
Philharmonic Orchestra and
John Rutter.
33

Classical BRIT Awards 2004
Nominations Checklist
FEMALE ARTIST OF THE YEAR
Cecilia Bartoli Decca/Universal
Hayley Westenra Decca/Universal
Marin Alsop Naxos/Select Music
MALE ARTIST OF THE YEAR
Bryn Terfel Deutsche Grammophon/Universal
The Classical BRIT Awards 2003
Sir Colin Davis LSO/Harmonia Mundi
Nigel Kennedy EMI Classics
NATIONAL SAVINGS AND INVESTMENTS ALBUM OF THE YEAR
Aled Jones Higher UCJ/Universal
Amici Forever The Opera Band Arista/BMG
Bryn Terfel Bryn Deutsche Grammophon/Universal
Denise Leigh & Jane Gilchrist Operatunity EMI Classics
Dominic Miller Shapes BBC Music
Hayley Westenra Pure Decca/Universal
Lesley Garrett So Deep Is The Night EMI Classics
Luciano Pavarotti Ti Adoro Decca/Universal
Ludovico Einaudi Echoes – The Collection BMG
Myleene Klass Moving On UCJ/Universal
ENSEMBLE/ORCHESTRAL ALBUM OF THE YEAR
John Rutter/RPO Distant Land UCJ/Universal
Choir of New College/Higginbottom
Bach, St. John Passion Naxos/Select Music
Sir Simon Rattle/VPO Beethoven Symphonies EMI Classics
CRITICS AWARD
LSO/Jansons: Mahler/Symphony No.6 LSO (Harmonia Mundi)
Rattle/VPO: Beethoven/Complete Symphonies EMI Classics
Vengerov/Rostropovitch/LSO:
Britten Violin & Walton Viola Concertos: EMI Classics
YOUNG BRITISH CLASSICAL PERFORMER
Catrin Finch Sony Classics
Colin Currie EMI Classics
Daniel Hope Nimbus
CONTEMPORARY MUSIC AWARD
Gidon Kremer Happy Birthday Nonesuch/Warner Classics
John Rutter Distant Land UCJ/Universal
Phillip Glass The Hours Nonesuch/Warner Classics
OUTSTANDING CONTRIBUTION TO MUSIC AWARD
Renée Fleming In the gift of the BPI Council
CLASSICAL BRIT AWARDS COMMITTEE
Chairman: Rob Dickins (Instant Karma)
David Blake (Select Music) Ginny Cooper (Chandos Records)
Matthew Cosgrove (Warner Classics) Chris Craker (Sanctuary Classics)
John Cronin (BMG) Jeremy Elliott (Retrospective Recordings)
Bill Holland (Universal Classics and Jazz) Beryl Korman (Upbeat Recordings)
Theo Lap (EMI Classics) Barry McCann (EMI Classics) Serge Rousset (Harmonia Mundi)
Mike Spring (Hyperion Records) Alun Taylor (Sony Classics)
FOR THE BPI
Adrian Carter, Andrew Ellis, Peter Jamieson, Sarah Stuart
EVENT & SHOW
Lisa Anderson (BRITs TV) & Mark Wells (Carlton Productions) Executive Producers
Sarah Sinclair Sponsorship and External Relations Management
BRITs TV in association with Carlton Productions Television Show Production
Helen Terry Producer
Janet Fraser Crook Director
Annie Crofts Production Manager
MJK Productions Stage Production
Peter Bingemann Set Design
LD Communications Media and Public Relations
Eagle Rock Entertainment International TV Sales
Adrian Carter and Abigail Stacey Ticketing
Emma Fanning Legal Advisor
jmenternational.com Graphic Design
EVENT BROCHURE
jmenternational.com Publisher
Andrew Stewart Consultant Editor
Kathy Leppard Consultant Advertising Director
CATERING
Leith’s
WITH SPECIAL THANKS TO
National Savings and Investments
and The Royal Albert Hall
36
Mumm Champagne are proud to be the official champagne of the
Classical BRIT Awards. As a patron of excellence, the brand has
adopted a highly selective approach to its involvement across the
arts and are delighted to be involved in tonight’s event.
Tonight Mumm have generously donated a Magnum of Mumm
which will be signed by all the artists and raffled off for charity at
an event later this year.
The history of the House of Mumm covers a century and a half of
passion, dynamism and the pursuit of excellence. It is this tradition
that has given rise to the renown and worldwide appreciation of
Mumm and the famous Cordon Rouge. As a prestigious champagne
house of international renown, Mumm flies the flag for champagne
and the Champagne region. All the richness and finesse of the
Mumm vineyard is expressed in Cordon Rouge.

NATIONAL SAVINGS
AND INVESTMENTS
proudly sponsors the
Classical BRIT Awards
Have a wonderful evening