Oxford Chamber Music Festival 2026 - New Worlds: Two Americas, One Storm

Beethoven's Storm Meets Piazzolla's Tango

Oxford Chamber Music Festival has spent 26 years putting world-class players into small Cotswold rooms, and this one puts a full string quintet, a solo flute and a bandoneon into the nave of St John the Baptist Church for a night that runs European Romanticism straight into Latin American passion.

The programme opens with Beethoven's String Quintet in C major, Op. 29, nicknamed 'Storm' for its turbulent finale, moves through Arthur Foote's Night Piece for flute and string quartet and Ginastera's Impresiones de la Puna, then closes with Astor Piazzolla's Tango Sensations, played on bandoneon by Marcelo Nisinman alongside violinist Minna Pensola and festival founder Priya Mitchell, who has run OCMF since 2000 and been called "a musical miracle" by the Telegraph. Thyme and Lovage, directly opposite the church, is taking bookings for a pre-concert supper and interval drinks for anyone who wants to make a full evening of it.

A bandoneon in a stone church carries nothing like it does on a recording, and this is one of the few chances all year to hear one properly close.

Thursday 24 September 2026 · St John the Baptist Church, Church Green, Burford OX18 4RY · Starts 7:30pm