Welcome to the homepage of the Berkshire Chamber Music Festival, a series of world class chamber music concerts, educational workshops and concerts for people who are not able to travel to us; be that in a care-home, a hospice or a prison.
Everything that the BCMF does aims to bring the community together and to promote intergenerational enjoyment of music. Our overriding priority is the people that we play for and their communities.
Each year we have a theme which makes both our workshops and our concerts engaging and educational and we work hard to programme music by a diverse spectrum of composers alongside more familiar names. We employ diverse musicians, seeking especially to provide opportunities for young musicians starting out in the profession.
Each of our concerts offer quality, inclusive musical programmes performed by outstanding world-class musicians in beautiful local venues.
We choose smaller venues deliberately with the aim of bringing chamber music to those who might not otherwise have access to it, in rural areas so that those who find travel harder are able to reach us.
Our schools project gives children the opportunity to work with professional musicians, to see how they work and to collaborate with them.
One of the best parts of the week is seeing the sense of achievement they feel when they hear their compositions. The benefits of music in education are well documented and we are proud to contribute to the provision of this in Berkshire schools. We aim for this to be a longstanding project with our partner schools, so that the schools can rely on us coming back year on year.
This year the award-winning MishMash productions will come to present Toot!, a 40 minute, interactive chamber music concert for children 5-10.
The children are taken on a journey with movement, comedy and diverse repertoire. This show has had huge success both nationally and internationally and we are so excited to invite them to perform for audiences in Berkshire. These concerts will take place in easy to access, local venues such as libraries and will be completely free of charge.
We have been playing for local residential facilities since our inception in 2019. We have a long-standing relationship with the Sue Ryder hospice and several links with care-homes in the area including Lakeside care-home, Falkland Grange, West Berkshire Community Hospital, Cressingham Road care-home and St Luke's care-home. Our concerts in these places have been hugely successful to date providing both patients and the staff with some much needed respite.
The 2025 Festival will take place between the 1st and 8th of June. Concert details can be found on our events page.
Tickets are available here.
Please contact us if you are interested in our work, we love to hear from schools or organisations who would like us to visit. Please also contact us if you are a venue and would be interested in hosting a concert.