This year, La Serenissima celebrated 30 years of championing uplifting Italian Baroque music. It’s an amazing feat, particularly for an organisation as small as ours. We are grateful to everyone who has helped us on our way.
This year, La Serenissima celebrated 30 years of championing uplifting Italian Baroque music. It’s an amazing feat, particularly for an organisation as small as ours. We are grateful to everyone who has helped us on our way.We concluded our Wigmore Hall residency, The A–Z of Italian Baroque (originally scheduled for 2020), with three projects we’ll remember for a long time: The Contest of Apollo and Pan with recorder players Tabea Debus and Miriam Monaghan, La Rossa with trumpeters Simon Munday and Matt Wells, and Ariosti’s extraordinary and little-known oratorio La profezia d’Eliseo nell’assedio di Samaria, with Julia Doyle, Mhairi Lawson, Hilary Summers, Alessandro Fisher and Neal Davies. The residency gave us a much-valued home, and as The Arts Desk put it, it “sent audience out into the streets with a spring in their step”.
On disc, we released Vivaldi’s complete Opus 8, marking the 300th anniversary of the Amsterdam publication, with a new interpretation of The Four Seasons. The album reached No. 6 in the UK Classical Chart and received a double 5-star review from BBC Music Magazine. Crossing Borders followed on 13 June, entering the UK Classical Chart at (uncannily) No. 13, with Gramophone praising La Serenissima and Adrian Chandler’s “crisp, zesty” sound.
Then, 2025 took an unexpected turn. On a walk in the Brecon Beacons, Adrian fell and severed two tendons in his right shoulder. We are grateful to our players, promoters and audiences for their support and flexibility as we have had to rethink plans and reshape programmes while Adrian recovered from surgery. One concert entered La Serenissima history: at Music in Country Churches, Adrian gave his conducting debut (left hand only) in the presence of His Majesty King Charles III. A concert no one will forget in a hurry.
This autumn we returned to Turner Sims (Southampton), Vinehall (East Sussex), St Martin-in-the-Fields (London), The Tung Auditorium (Liverpool) and Cambridge Early Music, performing music for mandolin and strings by Bigaglia, Brescianello and Vivaldi with Raffaele La Ragione. In October we recorded this mandolin repertoire with producer Matthew Bennett and engineer Dave Rowell. Our latest album Vivaldi 8+ was released in November, coming in at No. 17 in the UK Classical Chart, and we are proud to continue building our catalogue with Signum Records.
We gratefully acknowledge the support of our Patron, His Excellency the Ambassador of Italy, and the ongoing commitment of our Board of Trustees, as well as the individuals and organisations who make so much of our work possible behind the scenes.
Looking ahead to 2026, we hope to broaden our reach with more concerts outside London; release Giro d’Italia, a musical tour of Italy; explore the lineage of Vivaldi’s teaching with an album of chamber works by Somis, Leclair, Guillemain and Mascitti; record Crossing Borders 2; and begin a concerto grosso project featuring Corbett, Locatelli, Valentini and Vivaldi. We also plan to relaunch Emerging Artist Chairs, creating opportunities for a new generation of young professionals.
Although the landscape for cultural projects in the UK remains compromised by economic challenges, we hope La Serenissima’s music-making can continue to spread joy for listeners in 2026 and beyond. Thank you for championing this long-term adventure.
Happy Christmas! Camilla & Adrian
2026 Concerts 6pm, Saturday 24th January 2026 The Tung Auditorium, Liverpool 18th Century Music travels Across The Italian Border Tickets from £16
7:30pm, Friday 6th February 2026 St Martin in the Fields, London Crossing Borders Tickets from £10
7:30pm, Wednesday 24th February 2026 Keble College Chapel, Oxford Crossing Borders Tickets from £25
Adrian and I are working hard to secure more performances for 2026 and would welcome suggestions, recommendations, and any championing that supporters wish to do on our behalf. Our latest press brochure can be viewed here for those that are interested.
