Religion and Ritual in Ancient Rome
We shall be looking at Roman state religion, including the Olympian gods “imported” from the Greeks and also the “home-grown” deities with the rituals and ceremonies enacted by the Romans to both honour and placate their gods. If time permits, … More details …
Mozart: a life in choral music
Mozart is a legendary composer whose legacy and influence continues to impact on our lives today. Join us as we take a unique look at Mozart’s life through the lens of his writing for choir, from his earliest works to … More details …
How big is infinity and other questions
Many people approach mathematics with fear and trembling. They remember it as a subject from school that was boring, pointless and difficult to understand. This course will take you down some mathematically less travelled roads. In particular, we shall look … More details …
David Copperfield – The Personal History of…..by Charles Dickens
This five week course will study Dickens’s most autobiographical novel – The Personal History of David Copperfield. Serialised between 1849 – 1850, it only emerged much later that so much of David’s life has its roots in Dickens’s own early … More details …
Music from the Movies
This course is now fully booked. Please contact us if you would like to be added to the waiting list for any cancellations. Join Ben England, award-winning conductor and educator for a day exploring the origins of film music, presented … More details …
Poetry and the Passage of Time
The passage of time is a theme explored by many poets. In this three-week course we’ll read and discuss poems from the Bloodaxe anthology, Being Human (2011), which includes a wide variety of poetry from this and the previous century, … More details …
Brahms: Inspiration or perspiration?
Poor old Brahms sometimes finds himself facing undue criticism. Despite being widely recognized as one of the greatest composers in history, some people encounter challenges when trying to connect with his music. Is it due to its complexity? Or perhaps … More details …
The colourful life of Cleopatra and her times
This course is now fully booked. Please contact us if you would like to be added to the waiting list in case of any cancellations. As with all the best stories, the truth is stranger than fiction, so come along … More details …
‘The World’s Wife’: Carol Ann Duffy
‘The World’s Wife’ is a collection of 30 dramatic monologues in which Carol Ann Duffy pursues one of her major concerns: to give voice to those in society who are not usually heard. Many of the wives portrayed may be … More details …
Women of the Classical World
By using a range of sources from the ancient world including grave markers, legal disputes and letters, it is possible to bring to life a range of Greek and Roman women. What we can learn about their lives tells us … More details …
Calling all Trollopes!
The first two weeks of the course will be spent looking at Miss Mackenzie (1865) who is described as ‘neither beautiful nor clever’ and is plagued by unsuitable suitors when she inherits a sizeable sum of money. This novel is … More details …
Glories of the Musical Baroque
Classical music is usually divided into discrete periods which aim to capture something of a prevailing style and approach of composers in Europe at a given time. But what do we really mean by these labels? In this day-course, we … More details …
Great English Song Cycles
European Art Song emerged primarily in Germany and Austria in the nineteenth century and soon captured the imagination of composers across Europe. English composers took a while to catch on, but when they did, the results were truly wonderful. Today … More details …
Managing Mixed Media
This course is now fully booked. Please contact us if you would like to be placed on the waiting list in case of any cancellations. Experiment with drawing materials. Try out various media to enrich your artwork such as collage, … More details …
On Extended Wings – Six modern American poets
Over the last hundred years American poets have assimilated a huge range of influences including jazz and blues, the new psychologies, advertising, film, and a variety of landscapes from Boston to the Rockies. And while recognising the importance of the … More details …