Topsham Music Festival 2024 – Friday April 5th to Sunday April 7th
Hello, my name is Nina Savicevic and I am the founder and artistic director of the Topsham Music Festival.
The festival concentrates on instrumental music, featuring recitals by professional soloists and small chamber groups. Its aim is to offer the public an enjoyable selection of classical music recitals, which they might otherwise find hard to access in Devon, and also to give performance opportunities to young, talented musicians who are in the process of launching professional musical careers.
Being a young musician myself, I am aware of how competitive it is to find performance opportunities and make a living as a musician, especially since the Covid pandemic, when a career in music became particularly difficult to achieve.
To help them get through unprecedented difficulties during the pandemic, many people relied on the Arts (in particular music, film and TV), but access to live performances – and the social interaction which is part of them – was obviously severely curtailed for some time.
As we came out of the pandemic, I wanted to do something to offset that loss of performance opportunities by providing a platform for musicians, and by bringing together members of the local community and concert-goers from further afield.
My team and I envisage the festival becoming a well-known music event in the UK, and we would particularly like it to have a reputation for treating young musicians well. Although the number of opportunities to perform in the UK is now increasing, many contracts require young musicians to perform for a very small fee – and sometimes for no fee at all. For a musician trying to make a living, this is not sustainable, and after all the hard work that goes into practising for a concert, performing for free is not a good return. Our festival aims to pay its musicians a decent rate and look after them well during their stay in the West Country.
I am really excited about the 2024 festival which will take place from the 5th to the 7th of April. We have six brilliant concerts lined up, and I hope it’ll be a stimulating weekend for everybody.
My team and I also look forward to planning more festivals in the future, so please do check our Topsham Music Festival website for further updates.
Meanwhile, see you in April 2024, I hope!
Many thanks to:
