Spring Tour with the Bridge Quartet

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I’m delighted to be teaming up with my friends the Bridge String Quartet again for a spring mini-tour. We first performed Haydn’s Seven Last Words in 2019 and have revived it each Easter since. Haydn originally wrote the work for the Good Friday service at the the Oratorio de la Santa Cueva in Cadiz in 1786 and we follow his original intention by interspersing its nine movements with spoken word readings, in our case classic and contemporary poetry by Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, Philip Larkin, Mary Oliver and many others. Forty years later Beethoven had just recovered from serious illness when he wrote his immortal late quartet in A minor opus 132 and called the central slow movement “A holy song of thanksgiving to the deity from a convalescent recovering from illness”. We intersperse the movements with readings from his letters and diaries and poetry by TS Eliot, who cited the work as a particular inspiration for his own Four Quartets.

Tuesday 21st March, 7pm (London venue TBC) - Beethoven’s Holy Song of Thanks

§Thursday 30th March, 7pm Chester Road Baptist Church, Sutton Coldfield, B73 5HU - Haydn’s Seven Last Words

*Friday 31st March, 7pm Holy Trinity Church, Dilton Marsh, Wilts BA13 4DP - Haydn’s Seven Last Words

*Saturday 1st April, 7pm St Mary’s Church, Boyton, Wilts, BA12 0SS - Beethoven’s Holy Song of Thanks

*Tickets £15/£8 via boyton7lw@gmail.com

§Free with retiring collection

Screen X

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I was intrigued to be asked recently to voice a new trailer campaign for Screen X and delighted then to attend a Screen X screening last week of Ryan Coogler's brilliant Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. I have to say it is an amazing experience for a movie of that scale and spectacle. Screen X is an immersive format using 270-degree additional screens on the side walls which effectively operate as your peripheral vision so that often you feel like you’re within the action or things are flying past you (I ducked more than once!). V gratifying too to see and hear our trailer played before the screening in its full Screen X glory (congrats to the creative team at CJ 4DPLEX). I highly recommend seeking out a Screen X cinema if there's one nearby.


An Exquisite Harmony

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Regular recital partner Gamal Khamis and I are delighted to be joined by actress Fenella Norman for An Exquisite Harmony, our latest livestreamed collaboration from St Mary's Perivale on Sun 6th November at 3pm. An Exquisite Harmony tells the moving and fascinating story of the relationship between Robert and Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms, drawing on their letters and diaries and including piano repertoire by all three artists.

When Robert tried to commit suicide in 1854 and was subsequently committed to an asylum, his wife Clara, celebrated across Europe as a virtuoso concert pianist, was left at home with their six young children. The young Brahms, then aged only twenty, rushed to offer his support to Clara. What happened next has been the subject of speculation ever since. Clara was later to describe their relationship as “an exquisite harmony of souls”.

A parcel arrives…

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A very exciting moment in the Kent household as the new CD arrives. It was launched a couple of weeks ago and has already been picking up some very nice reviews….

“A wholly exceptional and thoroughly engrossing achievement.” Robert Matthew-Walker, Musical Opinion

“A magnificent performance… rarely have I been so moved.” Christopher Axworthy, Music Commentary

"The performance by Gamal Khamis and Christopher Kent had me totally transfixed." Alexis Paterson, CEO Three Choirs Festival

The actor’s life…

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So you’re on a road trip round the western US and the team at CBS Sports need an urgent recording session for a promo for the celebrated Coppa d’Italia in two days time and it just has to be your voice… What do you do? Well, the travel recording kit, a hotel room pillow fort and a spot of early morning Zoom are all it takes. Here’s the temp studio and the end result. Nice work everyone!

Enoch Arden CD launch

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I am delighted to be giving a special performance with pianist Gamal Khamis at the CD launch of our forthcoming recording of ENOCH ARDEN and THE CASTLE BY THE SEA for SOMM Recordings on Tuesday May 31st 2022 at 7.30pm at 1901 Arts Club, 7 Exton Street, Waterloo, London, SE1 8UE (just opposite Waterloo Station). We will perform both works (about 75 mins) and look forward to sharing a glass of wine with friends, press and supporters. Tickets are available here: https://www.1901artsclub.com/31-may-2022-christopher-kent-and-gamal-khamis.html

Audience responses from our tour of both works last year:

“What a tour de force… an electrifying performance.”

“A magnificent performance from Christopher Kent with the very difficult piano part played by Gamal Khamis… rarely have I been so moved."

“Stunningly good…so well done and so moving.”

“An extraordinary achievement.”

"The performance by Gamal Khamis and Christopher Kent had me totally transfixed."

BAFTA nomination - The Forgotten City

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Many congratulations to all at Modern Storyteller on their BAFTA Game of the Year 2022 nomination for the brilliant narrative game The Forgotten City, in which I was pleased to play the devious Roman politician Malleolus. The Forgotten City is a narrative-driven time loop adventure set in Ancient Rome which invites the player to discover the ruins of an ancient underground city, travel 2000 years into the past, and unravel the mystery of its destruction by cleverly exploiting the power to wind back time. Here is a taste of the game including the character introduction to slimy old Malleolus….

Haydn - Seven Last Words

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I'm delighted to be giving a special performance this Easter with the celebrated Bridge Quartet at the beautiful church of St Mary’s Boyton in Wiltshire on Friday April 1st. The concert will feature Joseph Haydn’s timeless, soul-searching string quartet The Seven Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross, originally commissioned in 1786 for the Good Friday Service at the Oratorio de la Santa Cueva, with the movements separated by devotional words and meditations. This special performance recreates Haydn’s original plan by interspersing the movements with readings by me of classic and contemporary poetry, including works by Shakespeare, Emily Dickinson, Mary Oliver, Philip Larkin and others. The programme was performed to acclaim in London during Easter 2019 and revived for a memorable livestreamed lockdown performance on Good Friday 2021.

  • Friday 1st April at 7pm

  • St Mary’s Church, Boyton, Warminster, BA12 0SS

  • Tickets: £10/£15

  • Available by email from William Mitchell (boyton7lw@gmail.com)

No Time to Die

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And finally… after the aborted trailer campaigns for No Time to Die in March and November 2020 it was third time lucky with the movie finally opening to rave reviews last week. This is one of my favourite radio spots this time round, featuring the haunting theme song by Billie Eilish. Congrats to all at Universal and Chinagraph London and thanks for asking me to voice the campaign in each of its iterations.

Enoch Arden

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CK & GK at Menuhin Hall.jpeg

A few more mics than usual… Recording in the beautiful Menuhin Hall with pianist Gamal Khamis for our forthcoming CD release by SOMM Recordings of works for speaker and piano by Richard Strauss, including his setting of Tennyson’s epic poem Enoch Arden which made such an impact with audiences recently at London's Jermyn Street Theatre and the Three Choirs Festival in Worcester. An actor's life is never dull...

The Forgotten City

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I was pleased to play the character of the devious Roman politician Malleolus in this brilliant and intriguing new narrative quest game set in Ancient Rome 2,000 years ago. The design and storylining from developers Modern Storytellers is superb and has deservedly picked up a string of rave reviews from industry journals and bloggers. I’m pleased to say the voice acting gets quite a few likes too!