2025 ARTISTS IN RESIDENCE
Sean Shibe & Lotte Betts-Dean...
When we invite artists to join us as residents, there is no set brief as to what they do, other than to guide audiences through a range of exciting and comfort-zone-pushing experiences that demonstrate the range of their work and interests. This year, we welcome guitarist Sean Shibe and singer Lotte Betts-Dean back to the Festival, this time as Artists in Residence. Between them, they’ll present an enticing array of projects in spaces across the city…
30 March 2025
‘ It feels physically transcendent
which is extraordinary ‘
– Lotte Betts-Dean
Lotte brings three projects demonstrating the extraordinary range of both her voice and her curatorial flair, starting with Olivier Messiaen’s Harawi in the Octagon Chapel. With guitarist Dimitris Soukaras she has crafted a beautiful recital for Dragon Hall with music from Debussy and Britten, Sinéad O’Connor and Caroline Polachek. She finishes with an electronic gut punch in the form of Voice Electric, showcasing seminal works of the 20th and 21st centuries that collide human and computer generated sounds in a haunting sequence of song.
‘ All three instruments are important to me at this stage in my life, because they offer totally different things ‘
– Sean Shibe
Sean begins his residency where another legendary guitarist finished his career – the Maddermarket Theatre, which played host to Julian Bream’s final professional recital. Sean has taken this as inspiration for a tantalising concert that looks back and forth across the centuries, in music from Bach to Adès. He joins forces with 12 Ensemble and GBSR Duo for a programme of the intimate and the extreme, culminating in Oliver Leith’s Doom and the Dooms, featuring Sean on electric guitar. He finishes his residency at Norwich Castle, performing up-close-and-personal on the lute.