Oliver Zeffman: ‘Classical music is part of LGBTQ+ culture’

This Saturday London is set to explode with colour, music and celebration as Pride in London returns to the capital. Beyond the popular parade, the event offers activities embracing a dizzying array of genres – from drag shows to May Thai, speeches and activism to water polo – but a startling lack of classical music. This is where Classical Pride comes in. The following week (7 July), the UK’s first ever classical Pride concert will come to the Barbican. Conceived and curated by conductor Oliver Zeffman, Classical Pride will be the first time any major arts institution anywhere in the UK or Europe has given a classical concert for Pride.

‘I don't know why I didn't think of it before, to be honest.’ Conductor Oliver Zeffman will conduct the UK's first classical Pride concert on 7 July ©Matthew Johnson

With LGBTQ+ rights and representation having progressed significantly in the 51 years since London’s first ever Pride march, it may feel as though the ‘first’s for this community have happily all been completed. However, Zeffman argues, the need for this classical ‘first’ arises from the conspicuous absence of classical music from the mainstream Pride celebrations. ‘I don't really know why nobody's done it before.’ He pauses before adding, ‘I don't know why I didn't think of it before, to be honest.’ Queer composers have contributed enormously to the music we hear in our concert halls and opera houses, so a celebration of their legacy, as well as of the work of current members of the LGBTQ+ community in the classical music sector, feels long overdue.

Where the London Pride events historically have their roots in Pride as a protest movement, Zeffman’s Classical Pride concert seems to be more of a celebration of the LGBTQ+ community within classical music – I get the sense he’s keen to give classical music a voice within the LGBTQ+ community, not the other way around. ‘It's not like people don't play certain classical music because it’s by LGBTQ+ composers, lots of LGBTQ+ composers and performers have had great careers and do gigs all the time. It just feels a bit odd that Pride had nothing to do with classical music at all.’ Zeffman, like the rest of the industry, is keenly aware of the need to build larger, more sustainable and more diverse audiences, and feels this concert could be a step in the right direction. ‘It's all about trying to show that classical music is part of LGBTQ+ culture. If we’re talking about audience development, it seems a very good way of reaching a bigger audience – finding a large group of people who are already engaged in culture and introducing them to classical music.’

One element of how this concert will tackle shrinking audiences is through Zeffman’s imaginative programming. Every work played in the concert will be by a queer composer, with works by Tchaikovsky, Poulenc, Bernstein, Caroline Shaw presented alongside a new commission from British composer Julian Anderson. Was it difficult to put together a programme made up entirely of works by composers from the LGBTQ+ community? Not in the slightest, says Zeffman, ‘There are so many it's not very hard to find them. Similarly, lots of up-and-coming composers are LGBTQ+. You don't have to go find a dusty history book somewhere, the info is readily available on the internet.’

With a wealth of LGBTQ+ composers available to choose from, Zeffman explains how he assembled this particular programme. ‘Since we imagine there'll be a fairly large section of the audience that aren't core classical-goers and for whom this might be one of their first classical experiences, we don't want to “dumb it down”, we want to show the best that classic music has to offer.’ A parallel concern was reflecting the diversity of the LGBTQ+ community in the UK: ‘The concert cannot just be dead white gay composers. Bernstein is dead and white and so is Tchaikovsky, but we’ve included work by living composers like Julian Anderson, and across the performers there are a range of representatives of different instruments and of different members of the community. As a whole, we're trying to make the concert representative of all kinds of people.’

Anderson’s new work which will premiere at the concert, was commissioned specially for the event. Zeffman mentions how grateful he is to Anderson for fitting this commission into his busy schedule. ‘He's booked up by lots of big orchestras all around the world all the time, but I think the idea really spoke to him. Julian moved some things around his diary to be able to write this piece in time for this concert.’ Anderson has set The Leaden Echo and the Golden Echo, a text by gay poet Gerard Manley Hopkins. The new work will be performed by American bass-baritone Davóne Tines alongside a new LGBTQ+ community choir assembled for the event.

Tines will be joined by the choir of about 100 members pulled from LGBTQ+-specific choirs including the Fourth Choir, the London Trans Choir, the Pink Singers, the Rainbow Chorus and Surrey Rainbow Choir as well as LGBTQ+-inclusive choirs the Bach Choir, Brighton Festival Chorus, City of London Choir, Crouch End Festival Chorus, London Philharmonic Choir and London Symphony Choir. All the concert’s solo performers are drawn from the LGBTQ+ community, with tenor Nicky Spence and soprano Ella Taylor (pictured below) performing alongside pianists Pavel Kolesnikov and Samson Tsoy who, as ‘partners in music and life’ are set to play Poulenc’s Concerto for Two Pianos.

Concert soloists Ella Taylor (pictured), Nicky Spence and Davoné Tines were joined by the Philharmonia led by Oliver Zeffman in a recording of Caroline Shaw’s three-part song cycle Is a Rose, which will be released as an EP on Platoon this Friday (30 June) ahead of the Classical Pride concert. ©Matthew Johnson

With such an exciting mix of performers and composers, including concert host British broadcaster Nick Grimshaw, the UK’s inaugural classical Pride concert is surely set up for success. And with Pride being an annual celebration, it is tempting to look ahead. I asked Zeffman what the future might hold for the Classical Pride project. ‘All being well, we'd like to try and see if it can become an annual fixture.’ He is also keenly aware of how much more ground there is to cover.  If you're talking about celebrating the LGBTQ+ plus community in classical music, this concert is only five composers and five soloists so there are a lot more people to involve.’ Luckily, we have an no shortage of LGBTQ+ talent to showcase and explore.