Raffaello Morales, Farringdon’s Renaissance man talks to Christopher Sallon

Fidelio Café’s Raffaello Morales in conversation with Christopher Sallon

Fidelio Café

‘It’s an amazing coincidence!’ exclaims Raffaello Morales, the 37- year-old, Italian-born owner, manager, conductor, and musical entrepreneur behind the Fidelio Café. From the small first floor office of his Farringdon premises, he points towards a small house located just across the road dedicated to the nineteenth-century Italian patriot, exile and father of the Risorgimento Giuseppe Mazzini. Morales regards Mazzini as an inspirational figure. Although these two men are separated by more than a century (Mazzini died in 1872 and Morales was born in 1987), there are uncanny coincidences which link them, beyond mere nationality and their connection to ‘Little Italy’, as this area of Clerkenwell is still known.

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2025 Elgar Festival – 24 May to 1 June

‘Celebrate with Elgar’ in Worcester and Malvern – the Heart of Elgar Country
24 May to 1 June 2025

FOR TICKETS SALES AND INFORMATION CLICK HERE

Ian Venables: Featured Composer at the 2025 Elgar Festival © Michael Whitefoot

Ian Venables is celebrated as Featured Composer in this his 70th year at the 2025 Elgar Festival; 24 May – 1 June in Worcester and Malvern; the annual celebration of Sir Edward Elgar’s music and with whom he shares both a home and the inspirational landscape of Worcestershire. Symphonic and ensemble concerts are given by the Festival’s orchestra-in-residence, the English Symphony Orchestra under Principal Conductor and Festival Artistic Director, Kenneth Woods. World-renowned guest artists taking part include Raphael Wallfisch, Gareth Brynmor John, April Fredrick, Simon Callaghan and David Briggs. Tickets are now on sale.

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Season 2025-26 in Bremen and Bremerhaven

All-time favourites, comedy and operetta inform the choices for music theatre in Theater Bremen’s 2025-26 season The press conference to announce the 2025/26 season for theatre, music theatre, dance and youth theatre at Theater Bremen (info here) was dedicated to the memory of Michael Börgerding, the company’s former artistic director who passed away in January … Read more

The London Philharmonic Orchestra in 2025-26

The London Philharmonic Orchestra’s 2025/26 London season 

Key highlights: 

The LPO’s 2025/26 season theme, Harmony with Nature, explores humanity’s bond with the natural world and issues a call to protect it through the power of music that confronts, celebrates and inspires.

Contemporary voices throughout the season such as Gabriela Lena Franks’s Contested Eden (responding to wildfires), Gustavo Díaz-Jerez’s Tajogaite (volcanoes) and Anna Thorvaldsdottir’s CATAMORPHOSIS (a sense of urgency driven by shifting polar forces) offer a contrasting reflection to the idyllic scenes of oceans, forests and mountains of Beethoven, Mendelssohn and Sibelius.

The season also features seven-time Grammy Award-winning composer and trumpeter Terence Blanchard, who, alongside his own jazz quintet, will perform the UK premiere of A Tale of God’s Will (A Requiem for Katrina) with the Orchestra.

An array of star guests includes legendary violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, cellist Sheku Kanneh-Mason, pianists Yefim Bronfman and Alexandre Kantorow, soprano Jennifer France and baritone Stéphane Degout.

More guest soloists this season include pianists Paul Lewis, Anna Vinnitskaya and Pavel Kolesnikov, as well as violinists James Ehnes, Alina Ibragimova and Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider.

The LPO’s performing and community activity in its Brighton, Eastbourne and Saffron Walden residencies is also announced today. Highlights include an evening of song with Danielle de Niese in Brighton, and Edward Gardner conducting a selection of Elgar works in Eastbourne.

The LPO will perform 9 premieres across the season including (in London and Birmingham) Tan Dun’s Nine – an ‘ode to peace’ commissioned by the Royal Philharmonic Society as a companion piece to Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in its 200th anniversary year.

LPO Principal Conductor Edward Gardner presents ‘Phoenix Lands’, a two-concert focus exploring his fascination of twentieth-century composers from Central Europe.

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Edinburgh International Festival 2025 – 1 to 24 August

Edinburgh International Festival 2025
Breaks Boundaries in a Year Exploring ‘The Truth We Seek’

[l-r] Laura Beth Salter (Kinnaris Quintet), Festival Director Nicola Benedetti and Mia Habis (Dance People) © Laurence Winram

eif.co.uk / @edintfest

Edinburgh International Festival’s 2025 programme offers opportunities to experience world-class artists in thought-provoking and unconventional ways – including an eight-hour choral extravaganza, a distinctive outdoor promenade dance piece and a circus infused opera. Audiences can also get involved in many Festival performances, from an outdoor mass-singalong to interactive concerts where the audience chooses the repertoire.

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Bampton Classical Opera in 2025

BAMPTON CLASSICAL OPERA 2025
Antonio Salieri La locandiera (‘The Landlady’) (1773)

Performances:
The Deanery Garden, Bampton, Oxfordshire: Friday 18, Saturday 19 July
Westonbirt School, Gloucestershire: Monday 25 August
The Barn at Old Walland, Wadhurst, Sussex: Saturday 6 September
Smith Square Hall, London SW1: Tuesday 16 September

For more information CLICK HERE.

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‘Yorkshire Calling’: Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra’s celebratory concert at Bradford Live on 1 August

Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra headline Bradford Live on Yorkshire Day

Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra

Yorkshire’s finest talent to perform at the region’s newest landmark venue on Yorkshire Day (1 August) with an unmissable celebration.

The Yorkshire Symphony Orchestra will lead a celebratory concert called ‘Yorkshire Calling’ at the newly restored Bradford Live.

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