About Samling - Achievements

Each year audiences know Samling event by event and, from small beginnings in Cumbria, we have an awful lot to shout about. Masterclasses fed into Operas. Accompanists and singers became Samling Scholars and 2011 sees that pool grow to 200 young artists. Outreach programmes brought classical music to thousands of schoolchildren of all ages, developing our ties with Southbank Sinfonia and the Berkeley Ensemble. And fine art projects encouraged young painters and sculptors.

Distinguished singers from around the world, led by our Patron Sir Thomas Allen, together with internationally celebrated accompanists, artists and teachers came to Cumbria to lead week-long residencies that could and did change young professionals’ lives.

We have also reached out to the USA through the Lindemann programme at the Metropolitan Opera and Juilliard School in New York, attracting singers and enthusiastic plaudits. Nearer home, we carried our Showcase to St John’s Smith Square, Cadogan Hall, the Royal Opera House and, for the past five years, to Wigmore Hall in London.

However, we are not resting on our laurels – far from it. We want to build on what has gone before as we look forward to the years ahead. We recognise that they may be difficult ones, in the face of an economic climate that all too frequently freezes out the arts, but we believe that the dynamism that has marked our remarkable progress in the past fifteen years can be maintained.