Easter: A Seasonal Journey... The Passion of Mary Magdalene

Presented by Tom Service, including the world premiere performance of The Passion of Mary Magdalene by British composer Tansy Davies.

Tansy Davies's radical reimagining of the Easter story is told from the perspective of Mary Magdalene, disturbing traditional Gospel narratives around Mary as a figure and bringing her spiritual significance into the light.

Drawing on the non-canonical Gospel of Mary and poetry by Ruth Fainlight, and by blending period instruments with electric guitar, the Dunedin Consort, Anna Dennis as Mary Magdalene and Marcus Farnsworth as Jesus present this intense three-part epic that recasts Mary as a powerful female presence – in the composer’s words, ‘a wise woman in the desert, this kind of raw oracle’. Davies’s dramatic Passion hints at unearthing buried truths and the hope of a world cleansed of its demons.