Ian Bostridge and Christine Rice take centre stage at the Ustinov Studio as the 2023/2024 Deborah Warner Season opens with two special Recitals

This autumn, the 2023/2024 Deborah Warner Season - featuring theatre, opera, dance and song - opens with two recitals bringing some of the most important names in classical music to the intimacy of the Theatre Royal Bath’s Ustinov Studio.

Internationally renowned tenor Ian Bostridge and master pianist Julius Drake will perform Songs of Benjamin Britten on Saturday 30^th September and Sunday 1^st October. Ian Bostridge’s recital career has taken him to the foremost concert halls of Europe, Japan and North America. His recordings have won all the major international prizes and been nominated for fourteen Grammys.

On Monday 2 and Tuesday 3 October, Christine Rice, one of the leading British mezzo-sopranos of her generation, makes a welcome return to the Ustinov Studio. In last year’s Deborah Warner Season, she delighted audiences with her memorable performances of Britten’s Phaedra, which transferred to the Edinburgh International Festival this summer.

For her Ustinov Studio recital, Christine Rice will perform with two celebrated collaborators, the acclaimed pianist Julius Drake and the viola player Sascha Bota. The programme includes Haydn’s astonishing dramatic cantata Arianna a Naxos, and a selection of songs by Rebecca Clarke, Frank Bridge and Johannes Brahms.

Last year, acclaimed theatre and opera director Deborah Warner took over as Artistic Director of the Ustinov Studio with an exciting multi-genre programme, including sell-out productions of Dido and Aenas and Phaedra/Minotaur, which put the Ustinov Studio firmly on the map as one of the country's most unique and innovative classical music and opera venues. The season, which delighted audiences and critics alike, also featured a thrilling production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest and Dickie Beau’s mesmerising and inventive iShowmanism!

Deborah Warner’s second season at the Ustinov Studio, which opens and closes with a new Recital programme, also features an epic new production of Sophie Treadwell’s provocative drama Machinal appearing from Friday 20 October to Saturday 18 November, directed by five-time Olivier Award winning Richard Jones. This is followed by Benjamin Britten’s opera The Turn of the Screw staged from Friday 1 to Saturday 23 December, and directed by Isabelle Kettle, who returns after her triumphant 2022 staging of Dido and Aenas. At the start of 2024, a double-bill by choreographer Kim Brandstrup will feature Metamorphoses, a brand-new dance work staged alongside his stunning piece, Minotaur, appearing from Monday 29 January to Saturday 10 February. The recital programme returns to close the 2023/2024 Deborah Warner Season featuring soprano Sophie Bevan, accompanied by pianist Sebastian Wybrew, with performances on Tuesday 27 and Wednesday 28 February.