THE Cheltenham Music Festival, one of the UK’s longest-running festivals, has announced its 2015 programme, featuring a huge variety of outstanding music from across the globe. After enjoying record-breaking audiences in 2014, this year’s festival promises a similarly popular programme.

One of the most-popular artists featured this year is Grammy-winning American composer Eric Whitacre. Eric will be conducting the BBC Concert Orchestra in one of his most-popular pieces, Water Night, and a unique concert at Gloucester Cathedral where the Eric Whitacre Singers will be joined by British soul-jazz superstar Laura Mvula.

Elsewhere, the festival features a number of films with live soundtracks and a focus on dance that includes ballet at the Everyman Theatres and tango at Cheltenham Ladies’ College’s Princess Hall.

Internationally-established performers such as Edward Gardner, Sarah Connolly, Alina Ibragimova, Jean-Guihen Queyras and Marc-André Hamelin are all confirmed appear, as are emerging stars conductor Ben Gernon, pianist Martin James Bartlett, accordionist Ksenija Sidorova and BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artists.

2015 also welcomes the return of the Festival Proms, which kick-off the Festival with a night inspired by Gershwin’s ‘An American In Paris’ that features the BBC Concert Orchestra, conductor Ben Gernon and BBC Young Musician 2014 winner Martin James Bartlett. The Proms continue with performances of Mozart and Rachmaninov from the CBSO, pianist Steven Osborne and conductor Edward Gardner, and Mahler’s epic 3rd Symphony performed by Chetham’s Symphony Orchestra and Sarah Connolly.

Friday night will see Alfred Hitchcock’s masterpiece Psycho projected onto a big screen with Bernard Herrmann’s famous score performed live by acclaimed orchestra the Britten Sinfonia, while The Kings Singers complete the Proms series with a celebration of the 150th Anniversary of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.

Festival Director Meurig Bowen said: “Cheltenham Music Festival prides itself on delivering a programme that is both popular and distinguished. Everyone will enjoy the incredibly exciting and often moving experience of hearing the world’s best musicians perform celebrated masterpieces in Gloucestershire’s most stunning venues. Classical music connoisseurs will enjoy the depth of this year’s programme, which includes a staggering 22 premieres, as well as the Festival themes that they will hear subtly woven through the music over the course of the 12 days.”

This year’s Festival has thematic focuses on Paris and the music of 1945 (the year Cheltenham Music Festival started). The 1945 focus can be seen in music by Richard Strauss, Britten, Poulenc, Howells, Tippett, Shostakovich and Messiaen, while the French influence is present in a Parisian cabaret with Jazz vocalist and BBC Radio 3 presenter Claire Martin, a theatrical recital exploring the life and music of Erik Satie, and a screening of the 1928 silent film Jeanne d’Arc with live music from the Orlando Consort.

The Festival’s ever-popular chamber music series in Pittville Pump Room continues this year with the Arcanto Quartet, pianists Marc-André Hamelin, Gabriela Montero and Boris Giltburg, Danish String Quartet, “Harpsichord Ninja” (BBC) Mahan Esfahani and the New Zealand String Quartet with Julian Bliss, all performing.

Cheltenham has always had a reputation for championing new music, and this year is no different. A total tally of 22 premieres include a deconstruction of 1970s Disco by Graham Fitkin, Rolf Hind’s new work for contemporary Gamelan ensemble inspired by recent travels in Bhutan, ‘Entanglement’, a one-act chamber opera by Charlotte Bray about Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be executed in Britain, new pieces by Joe Cutler and Thomas Strønen for Trish Clowes’ genre-bending ensemble the Emulsion Sinfonietta, and works by Peter Wiegold, Jonathan Dove and Matthew Martin.

There’s also plenty for children to enjoy at this year’s festival, with a strand of events aimed at ages four and up: From illustrator James Mayhew’s live painting of Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition (with a bit of Indiana Jones, Holst and Grieg thrown in for good measure), to the ingenious slapstick of Classical Mayhem’s DECOMPOSED!, the animated delights of Magic Piano & The Chopin Shorts, and a Family Day in the beautiful setting of Cheltenham’s Imperial Gardens.

Elsewhere, Cheltenham’s Everyman Theatre will host the New English Ballet Theatre’s first performance outside of London with music by Glass, Mussorgsky, Villa-Lobos, Beethoven and Janacek, there is a performance of accordionist Ksenija Sidorova’s contemporary tango project with Rambert dancer/choreographer Kirill Burlov, and non-classical performers include Kathryn Tickell and The Side and Iranian percussionists The Chemirani Brothers.

Tickets go on sale to members on Wednesday, March 25 and to the general public on Wednesday, April 1. Create your Wish List at cheltenhamfestivals.com.