THE FESTIVAL

under creative direction of
Samson Tsoy&Pavel Kolesnikov

We've conceived the festival dreaming of a stripped down and candid environment for genuine music making, devoid of pomp and glamour. The unassuming and yet characterful spaces of the Ragged School Museum offer simplicity and some subtle mystery, and we’ve fallen in love with this building.

In just a few years of its existence the Festival gained strong following both among connoisseurs as well as those seeking alternative to formality of traditional concert settings. As casual as it is, it has become a platform for some of the most serious and devoted music making one may witness in London, by some of the world’s finest musicians of all generations.

A festival wouldn’t be a festival without dear friends joining in, and without everyone making new friends, too! We are grateful to the wonderful musicians who joined us in the first three editions: Nicolas Baldeirou, Elina Buksha, Alina Ibragimova, Andrei Ionita, Elisabeth Leonskaja, Mark Padmore, Aurelien Pascal, Lawrence Power, Tamsin Waley-Cohen, Albion String Quartet, and Doric String Quartet.

The romantic idea to do a “travelling” edition was born while the Museum was closed for extensive renovation. In close collaboration with Muziekgebouw, we bring the spirit and the concept to Amsterdam in the spring 2023. Not trying to replicate we make it in a site-specific way - something that could only really happen there, at that moment.

“Taken as a whole…this not-so-mini festival has capped everything in this extraordinary year: unrepeatable in its line-up, unforgettable in the programming and its execution.”
ARTSDESK ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

“Beating a path through the back streets of Tower Hamlets, I find myself at a stunningly good chamber concert.<…>Director Erica Davies explains, the plan now is to turn this potentially superb building into a performance centre for a borough which is at present a desert for music. Directed by Pavel Kolesnikov and Samson Tsoy, this new festival surely has a bright future.”
THE INDEPENDENT ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

“It’s hard to explain in words why this concert was so special. The building, the dislocated times and superb musicianship all somehow coalesced to produce an unforgettable musical experience.”
BACHTRACK ★ ★ ★ ★ ★

The Ragged School Museum is housed in a group of three canalside buildings which once formed the largest “ragged” or free school in London.

When Thomas Barnardo came to London from his home city of Dublin in 1866, intending to train as a doctor and then become a missionary in China, he was confronted by a city where disease was rife, poverty and overcrowding endemic and educational opportunities for the poor were non-existent. He watched helplessly as a cholera epidemic swept through the East End, leaving over 3,000 Londoners dead and many destitute.

He gave up his medical training to pursue his local missionary works and in 1867 opened his first “ragged school” where children could gain a free basic education.

Ten years later, Barnardo’s Copperfield Road Free School opened its doors to children and for the next thirty-one years educated tens of thousands of children. It closed in 1908 by which time enough government schools had opened in the area to serve the needs of local families.

The buildings, originally warehouses for goods transported along the Regent’s Canal, then went through a variety of industrial uses until, in the early 1980s, they were threatened with demolition.

It was then that a group of local people joined together to save them and reclaim their unique heritage. The Ragged School Museum Trust was set up and the museum opened in 1990.