Karl Jenkins: 25th anniversary celebrations for The Armed Man
The Armed Man is performed at the Royal Festival Hall in London on 7 June, celebrating 25 years since the premiere of this much-loved work. Other Karl Jenkins highlights in 2025 include a new BBC commission to be premiered on Radio 3 and the first complete performance in Wales of One World at the Llangollen International Eisteddfod.
Karl Jenkins is on the rostrum for a 25th anniversary performance of The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace on 7 June at the Royal Festival Hall in London. The work has travelled the world since its premiere at the turn of the millennium, passing the 3000th performance mark in 2024 during Karl Jenkins’s 80th birthday year. Performers in London include mezzo-soprano Kathryn Rudge, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and the Crouch End Festival Chorus whose recent recording of the ensemble version of The Armed Man was released last year on Signum Records, sitting alongside the classic Decca recording of the full orchestra version.
Commissioned by the Royal Armouries for the millennium, The Armed Man is based on the 15th century French poem, L’homme armé, and remains a powerful and moving reflection on the horror of war and its consequences. Particularly memorable events over the 25 years have included a performance in New York on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 and in 2018 Jenkins conducted the work at the Mercedes Benz Arena in Berlin with the World Orchestra for Peace and a choir of 2000 from 30 countries, commemorating 100 years since the end of World War I. Over 60 performances of The Armed Man are so far announced to take place around the world during the 25th anniversary year, which also coincides with the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.
Also on the programme at the Royal Festival Hall in London is music from Palladio Reimagined, the orchestral reworking of Jenkins’s tribute to the baroque architect Palladio, recorded and released by Decca Records last year. The programme is completed with selections from Symphonic Adiemus, the composer’s version of his classic series rescored for mixed chorus and full orchestra, released on disc by Decca in 2017.
Jenkins’s most recent large-scale work, One World, receives its first complete performance in Wales at the Llangollen International Eisteddfod on 9 July. Commemorating the 80th anniversary of the United Nations, this concert is more than just music, it’s a call for unity at a time of increasing division. Featuring Peace Child International and an international choir, the performance is conducted by Karl Jenkins and is set to embody the spirit of global collaboration and hope for a brighter tomorrow.
One World, scored for soprano, mezzo-soprano, baritone, chorus and orchestra, was composed in 2021-22 and deals with a fractured world (populist governments, plagues, climate change, human trafficking, disrespect for basic human rights, terrorism, war), heralding a vision of a peaceful and egalitarian planet. The score sets texts from the Bible, the Hindu Gayatri Mantra as well as the poetry of Percy Bysshe Shelley, Frances Harper, Kahlil Gibran and Carol Barratt. According to the composer, the work is, perhaps, best encapsulated by one of the texts: ‘Tikkun Olam’, Hebrew for ‘repair the world’. The recording of One World was released by Decca Records in 2023, and music from the work was first heard in concert at the Brucknerhaus in Linz in November 2023 and was featured in concerts at the Royal Albert Hall in London last year and at Carnegie Hall in New York this January, alongside performances in Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and Italy.
The next Karl Jenkins work to be premiered is a new BBC commission within Radio 3’s 25 for 25: Sounds of the Century series, celebrating the first quarter of the 2000s with 25 composers each picking a year to depict through music. The Signs Still Point the Way, written for the joint forces of the BBC Symphony Orchestra and BBC Singers, focuses on the year 2020 and is a musical meditation for the victims of the COVID pandemic. With text by writer Grahame Davies, the 10-minute score portrays images of the remains of things past as an allegory for our memories of those that have died. The composer describes how “the ambience of the music is melancholic with dark low woodwind a particular feature”. The work will be first heard on a BBC Radio 3 broadcast conducted by Gabriella Teychenné on 14 June.
> Karl Jenkins at Boosey & Hawkes
> Karl Jenkins website
> Further information on Work: The Armed Man: A Mass for Peace (full orchestra version)
Photo: Rhys Frampton