Click on the dates to read the respective programme:

• 18 May
• 19 May
• 20 May
• 22 May
• 23 May
• 24 May
• 25 May
• 26 May
• Extra Events

Saturday 19 May, 4.30pm
St. Matthew's, Westminster

The Sporting Life

Voice-and-fiddle duo Vivien Ellis and Giles Lewin make a welcome return to the Lufthansa Festival for another specially researched programme of ballads and popular tunes. For 2012 they take up a sporting theme, searching through the vast legacy of printed verse and music compilations, or 'miscellanies', to find long-lost songs offering insights into 18th-century attitudes to such timeless diversions as wrestling, boxing, cricket and horseracing, as well as forgotten sports such as stoolball, cudgels and quarterstaff.

'A gutsy tour-de-force.'   Sing Out

'Beautiful, vehement playing.'    Daily Telegraph 

Tickets £15 (unreserved)
 Buy a ticket for both concerts on 19 May and receive a voucher for a free glass of wine
Booking Information

3.30pm, St. Matthew's, Westminster
Pre-concert talk - A Very British Exercise

Dr Abigail Williams, Lord White Fellow and Tutor in English at St. Peter's College, Oxford, and Principal Investigator for the Digital Miscellanies Project, explores the background to Alva's programme.

Free ticketed event

Saturday 19 May, 7.00pm
St. John's, Smith Square

Vivaldi   L'Olimpiade  UK premiere
(concert performance)

Vivaldi's operas are becoming ever more popular, so could we consider going through a festival of Baroque music in London in 2012 without presenting Vivaldi's dazzling setting of one of the most frequently used opera librettos of the 18th century, a love tangle set against the background of the ancient Olympic games? Clearly not, and who better to entrust with its UK premiere than Adrian Chandler's award-winning ensemble, soaked as they are in the vivid and vibrant music of the Red Priest?

'La Serenissima play with such finesse, such precision, and yet such rollicking good fun ... It's a winning combination'
Classical Candour

Tickets £35, £25, £18, £15
 Buy a ticket for both concerts on 19 May and receive a voucher for a free glass of wine
 Friends drinks. More information
Booking information