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Cardiff Singer 30th anniversary

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Cardiff Singer Cardiff Singer | 16:52 UK time, Tuesday, 27 November 2012

The season ticket booking form, with details of all the concerts and recitals, is now available for the 30th anniversary competition in 2013. You can download the form here.

You have until 8 February 2013, when applications start to be processed, to get your form to the box office at St David's Hall. Season ticket booking is only available by post.

If you can't attend all the events, you will be able to book tickets for individual concerts and recitals from 1 March 2013. Booking for these tickets will be available online, by phone or in person.

Unbelievably, in 2013 it will be 30 years since the Finnish soprano and now opera legend Karita Mattila won the very first competition. Following her win in 1983, she exploded onto the international scene, and has remained at the top of her profession ever since.

In the archive section of the website, you can remind yourself of her performance and those of many of the other 362 talented performers who have competed in Cardiff throughout the competition's history.

Karita Mattila was interviewed in 1991 about the doors that suddenly opened to her following her win – first Brussels Opera, then Vienna and the Met soon followed. You can watch her interview, which is also in the archive section.

Karita Mattila Karita Mattila

Valentina Nafornita, the Moldovan soprano who was both the choice of the 2011 jury and audience for two prizes, is on the same trajectory as Karita Mattila was following her win.

Prior to competing in Cardiff, Valentina's career had been confined to Romania, but after the competition she joined the Vienna State Opera, where roles she has performed include Musetta, Clorinda, Oscar and Gilda and recently returned from a tour of Japan with the company for Le nozze di Figaro and Die Zauberflöte. She has just made her debut at Teatro alla Scala, Milan as Gilda, under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel.

Your Cardiff Singer memories

What has been the stand-out moment for you from the competition's first 28 years?

Let us know about the performance that made the hair on the back of your neck stand on end the most, and we will include as many as possible in our special history of the competition in the 2013 souvenir programme book. Remind yourself of some of the performances in the video archive section and email your thoughts to cardiff.singer@bbc.co.uk.

Auditions

The competitors for 2013 are being auditioned in opera houses and conservatoires around the world at the moment. The shortlist revealing which 20 will sing in Cardiff next June will be announced in February next year and will appear on the competition website.

Cardiff Singer 30th anniversary

Post categories:

Cardiff Singer Cardiff Singer | 16:52 UK time, Tuesday, 27 November 2012

The season ticket booking form, with details of all the concerts and recitals, is now available for the 30th anniversary competition in 2013. You can download the form here.

You have until 8 February 2013, when applications start to be processed, to get your form to the box office at St David's Hall. Season ticket booking is only available by post.

If you can't attend all the events, you will be able to book tickets for individual concerts and recitals from 1 March 2013. Booking for these tickets will be available online, by phone or in person.

Unbelievably, in 2013 it will be 30 years since the Finnish soprano and now opera legend Karita Mattila won the very first competition. Following her win in 1983, she exploded onto the international scene, and has remained at the top of her profession ever since.

In the archive section of the website, you can remind yourself of her performance and those of many of the other 362 talented performers who have competed in Cardiff throughout the competition's history.

Karita Mattila was interviewed in 1991 about the doors that suddenly opened to her following her win – first Brussels Opera, then Vienna and the Met soon followed. You can watch her interview, which is also in the archive section.

Karita Mattila Karita Mattila

Valentina Nafornita, the Moldovan soprano who was both the choice of the 2011 jury and audience for two prizes, is on the same trajectory as Karita Mattila was following her win.

Prior to competing in Cardiff, Valentina's career had been confined to Romania, but after the competition she joined the Vienna State Opera, where roles she has performed include Musetta, Clorinda, Oscar and Gilda and recently returned from a tour of Japan with the company for Le nozze di Figaro and Die Zauberflöte. She has just made her debut at Teatro alla Scala, Milan as Gilda, under the baton of Gustavo Dudamel.

Your Cardiff Singer memories

What has been the stand-out moment for you from the competition's first 28 years?

Let us know about the performance that made the hair on the back of your neck stand on end the most, and we will include as many as possible in our special history of the competition in the 2013 souvenir programme book. Remind yourself of some of the performances in the video archive section and email your thoughts to cardiff.singer@bbc.co.uk.

Auditions

The competitors for 2013 are being auditioned in opera houses and conservatoires around the world at the moment. The shortlist revealing which 20 will sing in Cardiff next June will be announced in February next year and will appear on the competition website.

James McLaren 1978-2012

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³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Wales Music ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Wales Music | 09:23 UK time, Wednesday, 8 August 2012

James McLaren, who worked as a journalist and assistant producer on the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Wales website, passed away yesterday at the age of 34.

He was enormously talented, hugely driven and an endlessly enthusiastic supporter of Welsh music, who will be well known to readers of this blog. This is a personal tribute from a colleague, manager and friend for over 15 years.

James McLaren

James McLaren

I first met James at Cardiff University in 1996. He was a rather earnest long-haired young fresher and I was in the year above, and we found a shared love of music which bordered on obsessiveness. His knowledge of music seemed to begin in 1990 and end in 1994, but boy could he remember the chart positions of those early Pearl Jam singles.

We spent many hours working on the student newspaper Gair Rhydd, which led to nascent careers in journalism. He went on to work for Big Issue Cymru and the Welsh Music Foundation (WMF) before joining the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ in 2006.

At the WMF he edited Sound Nation, a free monthly magazine containing music industry news and advice for musicians, labels, gig promoters and fans. Wales' only national music magazine was an important source of information, and his energy and passion for his subject was authentic and relentless. He was a well-known figure in the Welsh music scene who forged close and enduring friendships with many local musicians.

When Sound Nation closed in December 2005 he was made redundant from the WMF. He spent just one day out of work before I called to offer him some freelance work. I knew that he had the skills and talent to really make a difference in our online team. He adapted quickly to moving from print to digital despite being a self-confessed technical dunce. He enjoyed reminding me that he had been the first person to show me how to use the web, in the days when AltaVista and Yahoo! were at the cutting edge of technology.

He worked across a broad range of websites, including history and nature, but music was his real passion. He took over the ³ÉÈË¿ìÊÖ Wales Music website and gave it new life, and worked with news and radio to find the best way to break stories or inform readers and listeners. He was bold and tenacious and never afraid to give his all in pursuit of a story, all admirable qualities in any journalist.

Outside of work his main passions were rock music, good food and fine wine. He lived in Cardiff with his girlfriend Cazz, and Juno and Ella, their two beloved Flat-Coated Retrievers.

Writing about James in the past tense is an odd experience, and the shock of losing him is still raw. Right now there's a desk to my left full of the detritus of modern office life: half-drunk coffee mugs, discarded newspapers, CDs and scrawled-upon Post-it notes. And it's filled with James' presence and spirit, which will outlast any physical memento. He will be greatly missed.

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