I performed ‘Eternal source of light divine’ from Handel’s Birthday Ode for Queen Anne and ‘Let the bright Seraphim’ from Samson at a wedding held on Friday 12 July 2024 in the Great Hall of Battle Abbey in East Sussex—an abbey dedicated to St Martin of Tours and built on the site of the Battle of Hastings. I performed with Verity Wingate (soprano), Kristiina Watts (theorbo), Miriam Nohl

In the week that Labour won a landslide election in the UK and Mark Cavendish (fellow Manxman and childhood friend) cemented his 35th stage win to become the greatest Tour de France cyclist of all time, I was working in Paris with Les Talens Lyriques. This was just 20 days before the opening of the Paris Olympics. Having finally finished my book, ‘Just’ Natural Trumpet (www.justnaturaltrumpet.com),

I coached students of the Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester from 18–21 June 2024 as part of the Academy of Ancient Music's AAMplify initiative. I taught with Joe Crouch (cello) and (fellow RNCM alumni) Mark Baigent (oboe). I played first trumpet alongside the RNCM students in a performance of Bach’s Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen (Ascension Oratorio, BWV 11), directed by Alexander Rebetge,

The last few months have been quite a whirlwind—in fact, it’s been incredibly busy since January when we began rehearsing Mozart’s Così fan tutte for a staged production at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris. It was great to perform this opera at the Würzburg Mozartfest with Les Talens Lyriques and Christophe Rousset: we gave performances on Friday 7th and Saturday 8th June 2024 in the

I played as one of three first trumpeters with the Berlin Baroque Trumpet Ensemble (Barocktrompeten Ensemble Berlin), under the direction of Johann Plietzsch, in the Halle Handel Festival. We performed in the Marktkirche Unser Lieben Frauen, the church in which Handel was baptised and was first taught to play the organ, on Sunday 2 June 2024.The programme entitled 'The Mirrors of Versailles'

Only 24 hours after arriving home from our performance of 'Mozart and Friends' at the Mozartfest in Würzburg, I travelled, once again by Eurostar, to Brussels to join Les Talens Lyriques for their next project.I have visited Namur in Belgium on numerous occasions to rehearse (often with Vox Luminis), but I had never before performed in Namur: it was great to rectify that situation, on Tuesday 28th

I performed the programme ‘Mozart and Friends’ with Les Talens Lyriques and the bass soloist Benjamin Appl. Rehearsals took place at La Seine Musicale in Paris, with the first concert at ‘Le Majestic’ in Montereau (around an hour south of Paris) on Wednesday 22 May 2024, and two subsequent performances in the Würzburg Mozartfest (Friday 24 and Saturday 25 May). It was great to revisit

I played first trumpet with the Istante Collective at St Thomas the Apostle church in Finsbury Park, London, on 18 May 2024. The performance featured the three trumpets and timpani in Handel’s coronation anthem, ‘The King Shall Rejoice’ and in Bach’s cantata, O ewiges Feuer, o Ursprung der Liebe [BWV 34]. I played first trumpet with Will Russell on second, Rebecca Toal on third and Ben Fullbrook

As strong geomagnetic activity caused the aurora borealis to show itself over much of Britain, the Aurora Orchestra gave six colourful and mesmerising performances of Beethoven’s third (‘Eroica’) symphony for audiences in France and southeast England. We performed the symphony from memory at the Apex in Bury St. Edmunds (7 May), the Queen Elizabeth Hall in London (8 May), Snape Maltings in Suffolk

I played two of Handel’s Coronation Anthems with St. Martin’s Voices (directed by Andrew Earis) at St. Martin-in-the-Fields on Monday 6th May 2024. I played first trumpet with Rebecca Toal on second. I came directly from an Aurora Orchestra rehearsal at Henry Wood Hall, where I had been playing Beethoven’s 'Eroica' symphony (from memory), ahead of performances at the Apex in Bury St Edmunds,

I performed with the Brandenburg Baroque Soloists at the Chapel of St Peter and St Paul at the Old Royal Naval College in Greenwich on Tuesday 30th April 2024. The performance featured two choirs, the Old Royal Naval College Trinity Laban Chapel Choir (directed by Ralph Allwood) and the Chapel Choir of the Royal Hospital Chelsea (directed by William Vann). The concert was a choral celebration

There have been times in my career when I have performed in the so-called ‘modern premiere’ of a work, but I think performing in an actual premiere of a work that was written in the eighteenth century but never performed at the time is a first for me. ‘Composed in 1788, Salieri’s opera Cublai, Gran Kan De’ Tartari was a satire on the autocracy and court intrigues at the court of the

I performed Domenico Cimarosa’s L’Olimpiade (1784) with Christophe Rousset’s Les Talens Lyriques in Halle E of the Theater an der Wien in Vienna’s MuseumsQuartier on Sunday 31 March 2024. This concert performance of the opera took place just a few days before our staged opera production began—we will be giving six performances of Salieri’s opera Cublai gran kan de' Tartari (1788) in Halle

I played first trumpet in Handel’s Jephtha [HWV 70] on Sunday 17 March 2024 in Oslo Cathedral, with Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques. The performance featured the singers: Jeremy Ovenden (Jephtha), Deborah Cachet (Iphis), Sophie Harmsen (Storgé), Edwin Crossley-Mercer (Zebul), Tim Mead (Hamor), Lian Wei (Angel) and the Chœur de Chambre de Namur. This performance was the last

It was wonderful to be back at the magnificent Théâtre du Châtelet in February 2024, having performed a complete Schubert symphony cycle here around this time last year. I returned, once again with Christophe Rousset and Les Talens Lyriques, to give ten staged performances of Mozart’s opera Così fan tutte (1790). It is quite amazing to watch Christophe directing, juggling his roles as conductor

I first visited Malta in January 2013, stepping in at very short notice to perform Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 [BWV 1047] in the Valletta Baroque Festival. (Incidentally, one of the violinists in that orchestra recalled that I could ‘jump in’ at short notice on that notorious piece, and she put my name forward to record that iconic concerto at very short notice as part of the Ansbach Bach

The Hampstead Collective formed in 2020 and managed to present a season of 17 weekly performances amid the Covid-19 pandemic; it is fantastic that they have continued to give (now monthly) concerts in Hampstead Parish Church. They began the year in style with a performance of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio (cantatas 1, 3, 5 and 6), conducted by Aidan Coburn, on Monday 8th January 2024. I had the pleasure

I performed Bach’s Christmas Oratorio [BWV 248] with Vox Luminis four times in December 2023, with performances at: deSingel in Antwerp, Lyon’s Chapelle de la Trinité, Malonne Abbaye, and the Concertgebouw in Bruges. I played first trumpet with Will Russell on second, Krešimir Fabijanić on third, and Koen Plaetinck on timpani—a fantastic section. It was an excellent project, and such

I joined Les Talens Lyriques for a recording of Domenico Cimarosa’s L’Olimpiade, a drama by Pietro Metastasio. The recording was directed by Christophe Rousset and we used a new edition by Korneel Bernolet produced specially for the occasion. I joined Les Talens Lyriques on the last day of their rehearsals in Paris, at the Mairie of the 9th Arrondissement, on 17 December 2023. The following day

My final Messiah of the year (and last performance in the UK before Christmas) took place in Exeter Cathedral on Sunday 10 December 2023. However, the 'D major marathon' is far from over, and I’m looking forward to four performances of Bach's Christmas Oratorio, in Belgium and France with Vox Luminis, and a recording of music by Cimarosa with Les Talens Lyriques, in Paris, before Christmas itself. I