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Picture book creator James Mayhew joins forces with pianist Alexander Ardakov for a unique, family-friendly performance of Tchaikovsky’s piano suite The Seasons combined with storytelling and drawing.

Mayhew’s events, for which he devises and performs concerts combining classical music, storytelling and art, are legendary. Here he will be painting live, accompanied by Ardakov, and storytelling as he goes.

Mayhew is the creator of the best-selling Katie and Ella Bella books and many other titles, and has been writing and illustrating for nearly 30 years. He has also collaborated with a wide range of writers and artists, including Philippa Pearce, Elisabeth Beresford, Jackie Morris and Clara Vulliamy. In 1994 he received the New York Times book illustration award for Jenny Koralek’s The Boy and the Cloth of Dreams, while Shakespeare’s Storybook (with Patrick Ryan) received the Aesop Accolade from the American Folklore Society in 2002. Mayhew has also written for BBC television.

Ardakov is a graduate of the Moscow Conservatoire and a prizewinner at the Viotti International competition in Italy. He is a professor of piano at Trinity College of Music in London and has performed in concert and held master classes in France, Germany, USA, Poland, Russia, Denmark and London. He has performed for BBC Radio 3 and Classic FM, and his extensive discography includes Rachmaninov’s Second Piano Concerto with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Sir Alexander Gibson.

Age 6+