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Proms at St Jude’s 2025
30
June
2025
We were thrilled to return to Proms at St Jude’s in June for our seventh consecutive year, opening the 2025 festival with a truly memorable collaboration and continuing our commitment to community music making with our Schools’ and Family Concerts.
Opening Night with Dame Evelyn Glennie
Fantasia Orchestra joined forces with Dame Evelyn Glennie, one of the world’s most celebrated percussionists, for the opening night of the festival. Known for her pioneering solo career and her advocacy for deep listening, Glennie brought a spirit of adventure and artistry to the opening night at St Jude-on-the-Hill.
The programme celebrated the power of rhythm and texture, showcasing a unique dialogue between solo percussion and orchestra. It was a privilege to perform with Dame Evelyn for the first time, and we’re grateful to the audience for the warm reception on such a special evening.
Celebrating Young Composers
Our concert also featured the world premiere of Cathedral March by Alice Espitalier-Noel, the winner of this year’s Proms at St Jude’s Composition Competition. Written especially for Fantasia and Dame Evelyn Glennie, the piece launched the festival with lively flair.
Runner-up Chapman Shum’s duet Counting Down received its premiere as an encore, performed by Dame Evelyn and Fantasia leader Millie Ashton.
Inspiring the Next Generation
Later in the week, we were proud to lead the annual Schools’ Concert, in partnership with our friends at The DaCapo Music Foundation. 400 children from schools across North London came together to perform Pictures, a suite of songs by John Ashton Thomas, conducted by DaCapo’s Will Dollard.
Always a highlight of the festival, the schools' concert is an opportunity for children to rehearse and perform alongside professional musicians in a high quality, celebratory setting.
A Carnival for Families
We finished our week at Proms at St Jude’s with a joyful Family Concert, featuring Saint-Saëns's Carnival of the Animals with live illustration from the brilliant James Mayhew. From swans to kangaroos, lions to donkeys, the concert invited young audiences to hear animals come to life through music and storytelling. Rimsky-Korsakov’s Flight of the Bumblebee added a thrilling final flourish to the programme.
Proms at St Jude's is a festival that celebrates the best of music making across communities and generations, and we are proud to be part of it.
Photography: Michael Eleftheriades