Roderick Williams, joined by Leeds Song Director Joseph Middleton, returns to the Howard Assembly Room to give yet another spellbinding performance of one of Jeremy Sams’s wonderfully communicative English translations of Schubert’s song cycles. Franz Schubert’s pioneering The Fair Maid of the Mill (Die schöne Müllerin) influenced composers up to, including and beyond Mahler. A set of 20 songs for voice and piano, based on poems by Wilhelm Müller and completed in 1823, it tells the story of a young journeyman who meets and falls in love with a miller’s daughter and whose passion leads to jealousy and despair. Roderick Williams is one of the UK’s most sought-after baritones and is constantly in demand on the concert platform and in recital, encompassing repertoire from the baroque to world premières. Opera engagements have included major roles at leading opera houses worldwide including the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; English National Opera; Dutch National Opera; Dallas Opera; the Bregenz Festival; and Oper Köln. He has been involved in many world premières including Alexander Knaifel’s Alice in Wonderland; several operas by Michel van der Aa; the title role in Robert Saxton’s The Wandering Jew; and the UK première of Sally Beamish’s Judas Passion with the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

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