This year’s Hexham Abbey Festival is rich in journeys—musical and actual— crossing continents and oceans…

This year’s festival is chockablock with amazing shows that will make full use of Hexham Abbey—surely one of the most evocative venues anywhere in the north-east. We don’t have space to detail the full programme, but I’d particularly like to pick out a few standouts from the roster. Classical enthusiasts can look forward to solo pianist Danny Driver tackling Bach’s Goldberg Variations, while vocal group APOLLO5 delivers a candlelit choral pilgrimage. Elsewhere, the Festival Chorus and Orchestra take on an all-Beethoven programme featuring the Choral Fantasy and Mass in C. The festival also ventures beyond traditional classical bounds. Local history takes centre stage in ‘Singing Truth to Power’, a lively exploration of regional protest songs, while over at the Forum Cinema, a restoration of the iconic Antarctic survival film ‘South’ will be accompanied by a live improvised piano score. The whole celebration culminates in a grand finale courtesy of The Ayoub Sisters Quartet (pictured). Blending their Arab heritage with a Scottish upbringing, the cross-genre ensemble brings together folk melodies from Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, Algeria, and Scotland. Given that their recent festival appearances sold out quickly, grabbing tickets early is strongly advised.

Hexham Abbey Festival, 23-27 September, hexhamabbeyfestival.org.uk