Classical: Leeds concert season

To open the new Leeds International Concerts season in early October, the Bournemouth Symphony and their conductor, Kirill Kerabits, bring one of the most exotic and erotic scores, Olivier Messiaen's Turangalila-symphonie, with the enormous orchestra required featuring the solo pianist Steven Osborne.

PIANIST: Anna Tsybuleva will be appearing in the season in January.

Regarded as one of Europe’s finest ensembles, the Orchestra of Opera North have four concerts spread through the eight months, the first shared with the Leeds Philharmonic Chorus in a rare performance of Herbert Howell’s Hymnus Paradisi (November 25).

Garry Walker, winner of the Leeds Conductor’s Competition in 1999, joins them the next week in music by Britten and Elgar, while one of today’s most exciting young conductors, the Kiev-born Dalia Stasevska, has selected music by Adams, Gershwin and Bernstein (April 7). They conclude with Berlioz’s epic masterpiece, La damnation de Faust, with a star-studded line-up of soloists and the combined Leeds Festival and Philharmonic Choruses (May 12). Three previous Leeds International Piano Competition winners are also included, the most recent, Anna Tsybuleva, playing Ravel’s concerto (January 13); Sunwook Kim performing Brahms (February 24), and Sofya Gulyak presents Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue (April 7). Visitors from abroad include the St Petersburg Symphony (October 28) and Russian State Philharmonic (March 10), playing Russian programmes, with the Czech Philharmonic in an all Dvorak evening (February 10).