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The Berkeley Ensemble is a British chamber music ensemble that explores little-known twentieth- and twenty first-century British chamber music alongside more established repertoire.

Berkeley Ensemble
Origin	UK
Genres	Chamber music ensemble
Years active	2008 (2008) – present
Website	www.berkeleyensemble.co.uk

Founded in 2008 by members of Southbank Sinfonia, the ensemble reached the finals of the 2009 Royal Over-Seas League music competition and has since performed regularly in the UK and abroad.[1]

Their recordings and performances are regularly featured in the national press. Their album Lennox Berkeley: Chamber Works was selected by BBC Music Magazine as Chamber Choice in 2015,[2] and Lennox Berkeley: Stabat Mater was nominated for a Gramophone Magazine Classical Music Award in 2017.[3]

The ensemble celebrated its 10th anniversary with a performance at the Purcell Room in September 2018.[4]

Since 2016 the Berkeley Ensemble has curated the annual Little Venice Music Festival in London.[5]

The ensemble is named after the British composers Lennox Berkeley and Michael Berkeley.[1] Its patrons are Michael Berkeley and Petroc Trelawny.

Albums

The ensemble has released a number of albums, most notably:

• Cobbett’s Legacy: The New Cobbett Prize for Chamber Music (2019, Resonus Classics) received a 4-star review in The Guardian[6]
• Winter Fragments (2018, Resonus Classics) was praised for the ensemble’s “endlessly responsive playing” by Fiona Maddocks in The Observer[7]
• Stabat Mater: Sacred Choral Music by Lennox & Michael Berkeley (2016, Delphian Records) was nominated for a Gramophone Award[3]
• Lennox Berkeley: Chamber Works (2015, Resonus Classics) received a 5-star review in BBC Music Magazine[8] and positive reviews in the Telegraph[2] and Sunday Times[9]
• Clarion Call: Music for Septet and Octet (2014, Resonus Classics) received positive reviews in The Observer,[10] Gramophone Magazine,[11] The Strad,[12] and Classical Ear.[13]

References

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