Top music cruises compared

Royal Caribbean stage annual Music Festivals on five of their ships. This is a service particularly suited to music teachers and their students. Their package includes: festival adjudication on each Royal Caribbean International cruise giving an on-stage clinic for students, plus a chance to meet other students from across North America as well as visits to ports like Nassau, Ocho Rios, Cozumel and Key West. Accommodations in four bed cabins for students and double occupancy for adults/tutors, an awards ceremony with trophies, workshops by nationally recognized educators and so on.

Carnival offer an annual Rock The Waves with Gary Hoey. This years is a seven night cruise visiting Mazatlan, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo San Lucas.

A Fred Olsen sample cruise is BW0918 to Spain, Morocco, The Canaries & Lisbon. Featuring Barry Cheeseman, who is manager of the Kirker Escorted Tours programme, and has been an opera lover for more than 40 years and Christopher Monckton, former choral scholar at Magdalen College, Oxford. Concerts are held across the ship, and while some are open to all in the Neptune Lounge, but the majority are restricted to those who have booked for the festival through Kirker Music. Fred Olsen runs several similar cruises every year.