Musicfest 2025 tickets now on sale
Major programme of concerts announced for July 2025
Tickets are now on sale this week for this year’s Aberystwyth Musicfest series of concerts. Over a dozen concerts and recitals will be staged in Aberystwyth from Saturday 26 July to Saturday August 2nd.
There will be a rare opportunity to hear a performance of Serch yw'r Doctor, Arwel Hughes and Saunders Lewis' comic operatic masterpiece, performed by the Welsh National Opera orchestra, conducted by Musicfest Artistic Director Iwan Davies, with leading Welsh soloists Fflur Wyn, Robert Lewis, Paul Carey Jones, Steffan Lloyd Owen and Sioned Gwen Davies. First staged at the 1960 National Eisteddfod, this unique concert performance on Friday 1st of August is made possible by the support of the Saunders Lewis Memorial Fund.
Operatic legend Sir Bryn Terfel and Archdruid of Wales, Mererid Hopwood, will join advanced young singers from the Royal Welsh College of Music & Drama accompanied by pianist, Zoe Smith, in a celebration concert to mark the 150th anniversary of the Department of Welsh and Celtic Studies at Aberystwyth University on Monday July 28th. The concert will feature music by Wales's foremost composer of art song, Meirion Williams, and words by some of Wales’s best-known poets together with music and poetry that trace Williams’ legacy and celebrate the influence he had on the next generations of Welsh songwriters.
Other concerts at this year’s festival will include Sinfonia Cymru, The Art Deco Trio, The Welsh Chamber Orchestra and violinist Sara Trickey. Jane Austen will be commemorated in words and music with soprano Claire Booth and actor Alex Kingston in a programme curated by pianist Andrew Matthews-Owen. Composer and violinist Simmy Singh will participate in an innovative new music-theatre work for children in association with Cwmni Theatr Arad Goch, supported by Ty Cerdd and the National Eisteddfod of Wales.
The full programme is available to view on the festival’s website: musicfestaberystwyth.org. Tickets are on sale via aberystwythartscentre.co.uk or by phoning 01970 623232.
In announcing the festival programme, Iwan Teifion Davies, Artistic Director,said:
“Musicfest 2025 will offer a vision of the ideal Wales, through music. Wythnos yng Nghymru Fydd, Islwyn Ffowc Elis’s seminal 1957 novel, invites us to imagine the Wales we want to see. In the centenary of his birth, and inspired by his key themes, we will bring to life a society where equality, the Welsh language, and our relationship with the world around us, are celebrated and interrogated, creating a unique experience of Welshness through music and words.
“Performing Serch yw’r Doctor will be a fitting tribute to two of the towering creative figures of twentieth century Wales, marking 40 years since the death of Saunders Lewis, and the year in which the National Eisteddfod returns to the area of Arwel Hughes's birth.”
Carol Nixon, Chair of Musicfest, added:
“This year’s festival programme will have Welsh connections, representing the full range of musical styles, diversity of performers, exciting new music, work for and with young people, performed by artists of the highest quality.
“Since 1986, we have hosted an exciting fusion of a world-class music festival and a summer school, attracting an international roster of artists, teachers, students and audience alike. Please book your tickets now and join us for what will be an amazing summer festival experience.”
Ends
For media enquiries, please contact Emyr Williams emyr.w@btinternet.com or Joan Rowlands, Festival Administrator on 01970 612034 or email musicfest@aber.ac.uk