APRIL FREDRICK

'...a real soprano, her tone is beautifully placed..'

Christopher Morley

About April

April is a soprano with a passion for nuance and text which gets to the heart of both music and character. Equally at home on the opera stage, concert hall and recording studio, April has recently premiered the title role of John Joubert’s opera Jane Eyre in a live concert recording (due for release on SOMM Recordings in March 2017).

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Featured Review

‘An unusually charismatic performer, engaging herself emotionally from the first bar; I was mesmerised by the power of her voice, her control and her communication of musical passion. She had me on the edge of my seat and in tears’. Susan Elkin Reviews, February 2019

The New Album

‘Alan Charlton presided over these recordings before his untimely death, aged 47, last year. His innovative musical artistry comes through in heartfelt and energetic performances’

Michael Beek

BBC Music Magazine

Charlton’s vivid and imaginative cycle of Shelley’s epic poem The Cloud is brought to life by April Fredrick and William Vann in recordings done with the composer in the engineering booth.

Blooming Where You’re Planted: Becoming Red Lotus

Since May, I have been involved in an extraordinary project: Monk and Lotus, a new opera mingling...

‘The River’: Improvisation and Sounding Reality

Four Drums and One Stage On Sunday, I went to an improvisation gig by a jazz quartet at a venue in...

Smelly Shoes and Redemption

Today was a bit of a triumph, a laying to rest of old ghosts. For the first time in my memory, I...

Suchet, Swingouts and Semiquavers

Tuesday was a day of contrasts not as great as they initially appeared. First that evening, I went...

Death and the Semitone

‘For we shall be hereafter as though we had never been’. Cheery thoughts from Solomon, he of the...

Afterglow of a Instant Classic

‘Music, when soft voices die…vibrates in the memory’ (Percy Shelley) Two days after the recording...

Role as Relationship

Geography Learning a role is a bit like beginning a relationship. First comes the general...

Lines in the Sand

Having just prepared a large chunk of Ilia from Mozart’s Idomeno with the lovely Kensington...

The Balance of Furious Opposites: Dialectic in Jane Eyre

dialectic   noun  di·a·lec·tic \ˌdī-ə-ˈlek-tik\ 1:     philosophy: a method of examining and...

And So, Dear Reader

I begin, or rather continue, a relationship begun many years ago. Jane, who is not beautiful but...

Concert Diary

7 April 'Bows, Strings and Arrows' with Dei Gratia Baroque

Dei Gratia Baroque presents a concert exploring musical connections to archery and the Fletchers Guild.

John Blow                Cupid’s entrance (from Venus and Adonis).                   
Henry Purcell          When Myra Sings
G. F. Handel.           ‘Sospiro e vero’ from Floridante
Bononcini/Handel  ‘E pur in Mezzo’
G.F Handel              ‘Ah ci vive di Speranza’ from Muzio Scaevola     
G.F Handel              ‘Flammende Rose’ (Neun Deutche Arien)

St Vedast’s church, Forster Lane EC2V 6HH, 7pm

www.deigratiabaroque.org.uk

9 April Leicester Bach Choir

Leicester Bach Choir
Richard Laing, conductor
St James the Greater, Leicester LE2 1NE

Poulenc Gloria
Gounod Gallia
Messiaen O Sanctum Convivium

21 May Colorado Mahlerfest 2022

Colorado MahlerFest Chamber Orchestra
Kenneth Woods– conductor
April Fredrick– Judith
Gustav Andreassen– Bluebeard
Mountain View Methodist Church, Boulder, CO

Bartók’s Bluebeard’s Castle arr. van Tuinen/Karcher-Young

4 June, Elgar Festival

English Symphony Orchestra
Kenneth Woods, conductor
Worcester Cathedral

Elgar, Spirit of England

Part of the 2022 Elgar Platinum Jubilee Festival

15 June, ESO at Malvern Priory

English Symphony Orchestra
Kenneth Woods, conductor
Malvern Priory

Emily Doolittle, A Short, Slow Life (UK Premiere)
Strauss ‘Morgen’
Dvořák ‘Song to the Moon’

April sings a varied programme including a work by the ESO’s incoming Composer-in-Residence, Emily Doolittle.

13 July - Robert Graves Conference XVIII Recital

A recital with pianist and composer Eric McElroy as part of the Robert Graves Conference XVIII

Eric McElroy, piano

McElroy Two Songs (Dunstan Ward) World Premiere
McElroy Moon Songs (Ruth Fainlight) World Premiere
McElroy The Mirror and the Candle (Mallorca premiere)
McElroy The Fetch (Mallorca premiere, premiered by April Fredrick in 2019)

CaixaForum, Palma de Mallorca

13 September 'Judit', Bartók 'Bluebeard's Castle', Green Opera

Green Opera

April Fredrick, Judit
James Corrigan, Bluebeard
John Paul Jennings, conductor

Asylum Chapel, SE15 2SQ

Bluebeard’s Castle, arr. Thomas Ang

Productions

8 October Huntingdon Philharmonic

Huntingdon Philharmonic
Michael Karcher-Young

Vivaldi Gloria

April makes her debut with the Huntingdon Philharmonic under the baton of their new Musical Director, Michael Karcher-Young

6-10 November Saga Danube River Cruise

Eric McElroy, piano

April and Eric give three recitals and two lectures exploring the rich musical history of Vienna and the Danube as part of Saga’s Classical Music series.

3 December Handel’s Messiah, Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham

Nottingham Harmonic Choir

Richard Laing, conductor
Royal Concert Hall, Nottingham

Handel’s Messiah

April returns to the RHC singing the soprano solos in Handel’s timeless masterwork.

28 January, 2023 Stockport Symphony Orchestra

Stockport Symphony Orchestra

Philip Ellis, conductor

Stockport Town Hall

Richard Strauss, Four Last Songs

April returns to Strauss’s lush, poignant mediation on life and ageing for her ninth performance of the work.

16-21 May Colorado MahlerFest

Colorado MahlerFest

Colorado MahlerFest Orchestra

Kenneth Woods, conductor

April Fredrick, soprano,

Stacey Rishoi, mezzo-soprano

Mackey Auditorium, Boulder, CO

Mahler Symphony no. 2, ‘Resurrection’

April returns to the MahlerFest to sing Mahler’s epic exploration of life, death and the afterlife.

Featured Review

‘a voice of such clarity and purity that it could almost move the stones itself’

Hereford Times, December 2019

Featured Review

‘A voice of such clarity and purity that it could almost move the stones itself’

Hereford Times, December 2019