First and foremost, the Trustees all send their greetings and best wishes for maintained health in these worrying times.

For the past few weeks the Trustees have been monitoring the increasingly serious and unforeseeable circumstances of the spread of the Covid – 19 virus. Until quite recently we had hoped a festival six weeks hence might still be possible.

In the light of recent rapid developments and Government directives we have no choice now but to cancel the 2020 Festival. This is obviously a very sad decision to take, but inevitable in order to protect the health of our artists, our audiences and not least our volunteers. All ticket monies will be refunded in full automatically by Winchester Theatre Royal Box Office. They will contact you. Please do not contact them as they must work through events in chronological order and will be very busy. 

Our Artistic Director, Kate, writes, “It was with a heavy heart that I finally cancelled the artists today and told them that our festival won’t be happening this year. We have been so lucky that the damage to the festival has been limited by the goodwill of all and we can look forward to the next event as soon we all meet on the other side of this awful upheaval. I have re-invited all the artists for 2021 so let’s see what happens …”

Following up Kate’s remarks, If you are in a position to do so, we would be enormously grateful if you would consider donating some of your refunded ticket money to the Winchester Chamber Music Festival, in order that we can go some way to paying our artists a cancellation fee in recognition of their time set aside and the hard work that has already gone into preparing what we know would have been beautiful and memorable performances. This is an extremely precarious time for all musicians, many of whom have faced a brutal week of cancelled work and face crippling loss of income over the coming months. Donations, marked ‘ticket donations’ please,  can be made direct to our bank account:

            Sort code 309971

            Account no 76578560

            Winchester Chamber Music Festival Trust

 or by cheque payable to Winchester Chamber Music Festival Trust at the Friends’ Coordinator’s address:

26 Canon St

Winchester

SO23 9JJ

The Trustees are assessing how and when to programme future events and will take a decision as soon as there is a reasonable expectation that plans can be carried through.

 Our very best wishes 

The Festival’s Trustees