In 2026, Bill Barclay and The Gesualdo Six reunite for a major new tour to follow-up their international hit collaboration, Secret Byrd.
DEATH OF GESUALDO is a theatrical concert fusing music, puppetry, and tableau vivant.
In this staged concert, The Gesualdo Six are joined by six actors and a puppet who enact a stunning series of tableaux vivants, filled with iconography taken directly from Renaissance painting, to superimpose Gesualdo’s psyche onto his most chilling music.
The result will be the boldest look yet at how the life and music of this enigmatic prodigy must function together for the true Gesualdo to emerge from the shadows. What do we do with the art of monstrous people?
Touring the UK in London and York, in the US in NYC, and with more dates to be announced for 2026.
Upcoming Tour Dates
Britten Pear Arts, Snape, UK
Venue: Snape Maltings Concert Hall (MAP)
Sunday 18 October 2026 • 7.30pm • Tickets
Canterbury Festival, UK
Venue: The Great Hall (MAP)
Monday 19 October 2026 • 7.30pm • Tickets
Southampton, UK
Venue: Turner Sims (MAP)
Tuesday 20 October 2026 • 7.30pm • Tickets
London, UK
Venue: St Martin-in-the-Fields (MAP)
Friday 12 March 2027 • 8pm • Tickets
Saturday 13 March 2027 • 7pm • Tickets
About the Music
The music of Carlo Gesualdo has always been a cornerstone of our repertoire, starting with his extraordinary Tenebrae Responsories for Maundy Thursday, which we performed at our first concert. Gesualdo’s music is well known for its extreme style, with chromatic melodies creating dissonant and disjointed harmonic progressions that illuminate the most melancholy aspects of the dark texts he set.
Gesualdo is often portrayed as a radical in a conventional field, but it was composers such as Monteverdi who forged a new path and stitched the seams between the Renaissance and Baroque. The Responsories show Gesualdo’s adherence to the old, ‘Mannerist’ style, full of profuse exaggeration and dramatic hyperbole, yet confined to a polyphonic framework. He had taken all the elements as far as they would go, and so it is even more remarkable that the resulting music is a canvas of vivid colours and textures in which the most simple and poignant moments shine through.
Music is selected by Bill Barclay, drawing from Tenebrae, the mass Gesualdo wrote for his own death, and his most fascinating madrigals from books 4, 5, and 6. A new score is created with Gesualdo’s finest works, through-sung in a 75-minute rhapsody of one of the most fascinating and infamous characters in music history.
Previous Tour Dates
Edinburgh, UK: Edinburgh International Festival – The Queen’s Hall
Saturday 15 August 2026 at 11am • More information
Kilkenny, Ireland: Kilkenny Arts Festival – St Canice Cathedral
Thursday 13 August 2026 at 9pm • More information
New York, USA: St. John the Divine
Friday 13 February 2026 at 7.30pm • More information
York, UK: National Centre for Early Music
Sunday 18 & Monday 19 January 2026 at 6.30pm • More information
London, UK: St Martin-in-the-Fields
Friday 16 & Saturday 17 January 2026 at 7pm • More information
Commissioned by St Martin-in-the-Fields to mark its 300th anniversary. Co-commissioned by The National Centre for Early Music (York) and Music Before 1800 (NYC).
Produced by Concert Theatre Works
The creative team includes Olivier Award-winning choreographer Will Tuckett, best known for his work with The Royal Ballet and his visionary cross-disciplinary approach; former Director of Handspring Puppet Company Janni Younge; and internationally acclaimed American costume designer Arthur Oliver.
Created & Directed by Bill Barclay
Choreography by Will Tuckett
Music Direction by Owain Park
Costumes by Arthur Oliver
Puppetry by Janni Younge
Generously sponsored by Michael Katz
Reviews
Seen and Heard International, Simon Thompson | August 2026
“The Queen’s Hall auditorium was plunged into darkness, both literally and musically, for The Gesualdo Six’s theatre piece Death of Gesualdo. … The mixture of music and mime makes the event feel more like a ritual and, truth be told, it isn’t always clear exactly what’s happening. However, if it is a ritual then that matters much less and, if nothing else, it is an excuse to present 75 uninterrupted minutes of Gesualdo’s unaccompanied madrigals. And the Gesualdo Six did a terrific job, the blend between them as tight as could be while giving all six voices equal individuality in the mix. Ultimately, as well it should have been, the music was the thing.”
The Herald, Keith Bruce | August 2026
★★★★★
“The music was – on balance – the most important ingredient in the Queen’s Hall on Saturday morning … with six actors and a puppeteer joining the vocalists onstage … the combination with the flawless acapella singing of Owain Park’s sextet was unique. … Their perfectly balanced performance over more than an hour is a marvel.”
Edinburgh Music Review, Brian Bannatyne-Scott | August 2026
“[The Gesualdo Six’s] debut at the EIF marked another milestone in their extraordinary musical journey and will surely be seen as one of the highlights of this or any other Festival. … The Gesualdo Six sang throughout, their words and music contributing to the story being told by a group of six actors and puppets … The singing of The Gesualdo Six was well-nigh perfect … As ever, the outer voices of Guy James and Owain Park form the core of the group’s sound, but Alasdair Austin’s high countertenor is now taking a greater proportion of the upper lines, to the great benefit of the group as a whole. The two tenors and baritone do much more than just fill in the harmonies, and I particularly enjoyed when the whole ensemble allowed themselves to sing in full Italian mode, fiery and in your face. This is real Italian music, far removed from the cool restraint of Oxbridge and English cathedrals! The sheer outrageousness of his compositional style was brilliantly rendered by these sensational young men.”
The Times, Richard Morrison | January 2026
“The subject matter may be gruesome but the staging, singing and acting are sublime … the male vocalists of Owain Park’s The Gesualdo Six sing the composer’s music with white-hot conviction, aptly astringent tonal colours and intonation so perfect that it almost makes you forget how challenging it is to deliver those chromatic lines and jolting harmonic non sequiturs.”
The Guardian, Erica Jeal | January 2026
★★★★
” Singing with precision, pure tone and nuanced expression, their eyes blackened as if gouged out, The Gesualdo Six are outstanding … Led by the bass Owain Park, the singing weaves a spell that is broken only once, when Gesualdo emerges, ghost-like, from the dark church aisle and a split-second of shouts and screams heralds the moment of the murders. This show is a creepy juxtaposition of beauty and horror, like the music of Gesualdo itself.”
bachtrack, Mark Pullinger | January 2026
“Performed by the eponymous ensemble The Gesualdo Six plus half a dozen actors, it made for a striking experience. … Barclay made sure that the music was never peripheral. The Gesualdo Six sang with their customary relish, biting into the crunchy dissonances. Moro, lasso, al mio duolo … was superb in the execution of its daring harmonic progressions. The agony and the ecstasy were both palpable in this haunting Renaissance chronicle.”
The Spy in the Stalls, Jonathan Evans | January 2026
★★★★★
“The madrigals that Gesualdo composed throughout his life are beautifully interpreted and performed by the award-winning vocal ensemble, ‘The Gesualdo Six’. The close harmonies, beguiling arrangements and sheer vocal talent fill every corner of the vast space. Two tenors, two countertenors, a baritone and a bass recount the life and death of the composer through his own compositions. The tortured, but insanely sublime, harmonies, seem to defy every rule of musical theory but they touch us like dreams. … ‘The Gesualdo Six’ present it [the music] as a wonderful gift.”