Alpesh Chauhan
Stephen Hough Thomas Adès
Sergei Rachmaninoff

British Thomas Adès (b. 1971) is one of our time's most performed orchestral composers. He caused a stir with the chamber opera Powder Her Face in 1995, and the orchestral suite in three movements has become one of his most famous works. The opera is about the Scottish socialite and Duchess Margaret Campbell, the main character in one of the biggest sex scandals of the 1960s. The opera also caused a stir with its very explicit content, but for Thomas Adès, it was primarily a springboard to significant assignments and fame.

The Italian violinist Niccolò Paganini (1782–1840) was a scandal-ridden superstar on his instrument in the 19th century. He was also a composer, and his music set a new standard for violin technique. Most famous is a collection of solo pieces from early in his career called 24 Caprices. Caprice No. 24 is a series of breakneck virtuoso variations and has inspired many composers since. In 1934, Sergei Rachmaninoff wrote 24 new variations based on the one caprice and collected them in Rhapsody on a theme by Paganini for piano and orchestra.

Sergei Rachmaninoff had his big breakthrough in 1901 with Piano Concerto No. 2, and the next few years were hectic with little time to compose. The solution was to move to Dresden with his family for three years - a city with a fantastic music scene where he simultaneously could remain anonymous. Loneliness bore fruit − Rachmaninoff completed Symphony No. 2 in 1907 and conducted the first performance himself in St. Petersburg in January 1908. The symphony was a new triumph for the composer and, to date, is by far the most popular of his symphonies.

Alpesh Chauhan

Alpesh Chauhan OBE is Principal Guest Conductor of the Düsseldorfer Symphoniker and Music Director of Birmingham Opera Company. His debut album featuring orchestral works by Tchaikovsky, released with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra on Chandos Records in June 2023, was received to great critical acclaim, described in Gramophone as enthralling and named BBC Music Magazine’s Orchestral Choice of the Month.

Following his outstanding debut in 2015, he was appointed Principal Conductor of the Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini in Parma where he performed complete cycles of the symphonies by Beethoven and Brahms. Alongside the recently critically acclaimed Rheingold, other notable opera titles include Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk, West Side Story and productions of Turandot, including at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia.

Born in Birmingham, Alpesh studied ‘cello with Eduardo Vassallo at the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester before continuing at the RNCM to pursue the prestigious Master’s Conducting Course. Alpesh studied with Stanislaw Skrowaczewski and was mentored by Andris Nelsons and Edward Gardner in his post as Assistant Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra from 2014 to 2016. Alpesh was named ‘Newcomer of the Year’ in the 2021 International Opera Awards and in 2022 he was delighted to receive the Conductor Award from the Italian National Association of Music Critics for ‘Miglior Direttore’.

Stephen Hough

One of the most distinctive artists of his generation, Sir Stephen Hough combines a distinguished career as a pianist with those of composer and writer.

Named by The Economist as one of Twenty Living Polymaths, Hough was the first classical performer to be awarded a MacArthur Fellowship (2001). He was awarded Northwestern University’s 2008 Jean Gimbel Lane Prize in Piano, won the Royal Philharmonic Society Instrumentalist Award in 2010, and in 2016 was made an Honorary Member of RPS. In 2014 he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) and was knighted in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2022.

Since taking first prize at the 1983 Naumburg Competition in New York, Sir Stephen has appeared with most of the major European, Asian and American orchestras and plays recitals regularly in major halls and concert series around the world from London's Royal Festival Hall to New York’s Carnegie Hall. He has been a regular guest at festivals such as Aldeburgh, Aspen, Blossom, Edinburgh, La Roque d'Anthéron, Hollywood Bowl, Mostly Mozart, Salzburg, Tanglewood, Verbier, Blossom, and the BBC Proms, where he has made 29 concerto appearances, including playing all of the works of Tchaikovsky for piano and orchestra, a series he later repeated with the Chicago Symphony.