JUNE-AUGUST 2015 Volume 23 No.

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BROADSIDE BALLADS
The Carnival Band records the
hits of the 17th century
WIN!
IN HANDEL’S SHADOW A COPY OF THE
EDITOR’S CHOICE CD
Julian Perkins investigates the BY THE SIXTEEN
music of John Christopher Smith SEE PAGE 36

STILE ANTICO
The British ensemble celebrates
ten years of success
PLUS even more NEWS, COMMENT, REVIEWS and the DEFINITIVE GUIDE to what’s on in the early music world

EMTJJA15_001_Cover.indd 1-2 14/05/2015 18:03:05

 England, utrecht
earlymusic

my England
festival
28 aug | 06 sep 2015

k . n l
m u zie
ud e
w.o
w w
ay |
1 5 M
f rom
ket s
& tic
m e
g ra m
p ro

Sheppard Byrd Bull Gibbons Eccles Lawes Farnaby Tallis Tomkins

Handel Purcell Blow Dunstaple Jenkins Avison Boyce Holborne
oom15_adv_Gramaphone_210x276mm_06-03DEF.indd 1 06-03-15 11:22
 VOLUME 23 ISSUE No 3

JUNE–AUGUST 2015

30 21

ASH MILLS
MARCO BORGGREVE
BEN WRIGHT

54 24
REGULARS 21 FESTIVALS PREVIEW 33 MAGNA CARTA ANNIVERSARY
5 EDITORIAL Details of the forthcoming Three Joglaresa marks 800 years since its
Adrian Horsewood on how music Choirs and Gregynog festivals signing with their tour ‘Robbers,
and politics have long gone together Rebels and Royals’
22 EMERGING FROM HANDEL’S
6 NEWS SHADOW 35 BIG BALLADS PROJECT
The latest happenings in the early Julian Perkins brings to the fore the Find out more about the three-year
music world talents of Handel’s amanuensis, research project into 17th-century
John Christopher Smith broadside ballads
11 RADIO NOTES
Lucie Skeaping’s highlights from the 54 BACKSTORY – Q&A REVIEWS & EVENTS
forthcoming summer festival season Paul McCreesh talks to EMT 36 CD REVIEWS
about performing Purcell’s Our critics’ views on the latest early
11 UP & COMING King Arthur for the first time in music releases
Violinist Bojan Čičić nearly 15 years
44 BOOK REVIEWS
13 UNSUNG HEROES FEATURES Simon Ravens’ The Supernatural
Historical re-enactors 24 STILE ANTICO Voice: A History of High Male Singing
The British ensemble celebrates its
14 COMPETITIONS tenth anniversary 46 LISTINGS
Find out the latest competition results Concerts, workshops, masterclasses
and upcoming deadlines 28 YORKSHIRE BACH SOLOISTS and other events to look forward
Peter Seymour discusses his edition to this summer
15 ARTIST FOCUS and recording of Bach’s St Matthew
The Bach Players Passion
WIN!
17 LETTER FROM ABROAD 30 THE ORLANDO CONSORT one of five co
p
Göttingen The group have taken to the silver of this issue’sies
screen for their latest project: EDITOR’S
18 GETTING STARTED creating the soundtrack for CHOICE CD
(SEE PAGE
Part two of Oliver Webber’s guide Carl Theodor Dreyer’s La Passion 36)
to the baroque violin de Jeanne d’Arc

www.earlymusictoday.com JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 3

EMTJJA15_003_R_Contents.indd 3 18/05/2015 12:30:21

 academy of
ancient music
Bojan Čičić • director & violin
Angels and saints
Wednesday, 18 November 2015
West Road Concert Hall, Cambridge
Friday, 20 November 2015
Milton Court Concert Hall, London
and on tour in Stour, King’s Lynn, Dorchester and Truro

aam.co.uk/concerts

15-11 Bojan Cicic.indd 1 12/05/2015 18:13:47


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EMTJJA15_005_R_Edit.indd 5
EDITORIAL
WELCOME
‘A week is a long time in politics’, goes the old saying, and I’m penning this editorial seven
tumultuous days after the 2015 general election, in which time the political landscape has
changed dramatically. Just before the country went to the polls, NME magazine ran a feature on
‘Politics and protest songs’, in which British artists from across the musical spectrum talked about
how (if at all) politics affected their work; opinion was divided between those who felt that the
golden age of Bobs Dylan and Marley had past, and those who passionately believed in the
necessity of musicians using their platform to engage with important matters.
Politics and music have been mixing for centuries, however – whether it be composers trying
to curry favour with important patrons, or protest songs serving as a voice for the downtrodden
and oppressed. And many of the views expressed by the artists in NME aren’t exactly new, either:
disillusionment with government, general distrust of those in any position of authority, railing
against perceived ‘fat cats’, misunderstanding of particular religions.
This year marks the 800th anniversary of Magna Carta and its enshrining in law of what were,
at the time, revolutionary legal precepts. (Admittedly, the story of the charter isn’t quite as simple
as that.) Medieval ensemble Joglaresa have, with their usual flair, concocted their own musical
celebration of Magna Carta and its era, revealing some of the realities of life in the 13th century:
complaints about the cost of waging war abroad, maltreatment of the poor – sound familiar?
Read more about it on page 33.
Shoot four centuries forward in time and we reach the equally chaotic 17th century – yet still,
as the Carnival Band are keen to promulgate (see page 35), the poor felt hard-done by. Broadside
ballads were songs on sheets of paper that sold cheaply for a penny, and so a popular song could
spread widely and quickly on the streets of a city; recurring themes include anger at the tax-man,
fear of Catholic anti-monarchist plots, and lords and ladies and their outrageous antics.
On the other hand, England’s leading 17th-century composer was someone who, when it came to
dealings with royalty and the nobility, knew which side his bread was buttered on. Henry Purcell
was a firm favourite William III and Mary II, and Paul McCreesh and his Gabrieli Consort &
Players have been spending a lot of time recently exploring the music that Purcell produced for,
and regarding, the royal court. As I write, they’ve just performed two programmes of the birthday
odes for Queen Mary at Wigmore Hall, and King Arthur, their next project, is a setting of a libretto
by John Dryden that is thought to have been a thinly veiled allegory of the Exclusion Crisis of 1679
to 1681, when Protestant and Catholic factions were fighting over who would succeed Charles II:
Dryden, as a Catholic, was putting himself firmly in the camp of the future James II.
But, as McCreesh protests (page 54), does this all really matter to the music itself? King Arthur
contains some glorious songs, and broadside ballads have some rip-roaring tunes – indeed,
attaching the latest political polemic to an existing musical hit was a ballad-seller’s most trusted
tactic. In the end, it’s entirely possible – and often extremely pleasurable – to shut one’s eyes and
ears to the outside world and just enjoy the music; but let’s not completely forget how powerful a
tool music can be in effecting change in the ‘real’ world.
ADRIAN HORSEWOOD, EDITOR
SUBSCRIBE TO EARLY MUSIC TODAY SEE PAGE 53
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 5
14/05/2015 18:29:31
 NEWS
EARLY MUSIC AT THE PROMS VIENNESE
BAROQUE IN
GUY VIVIEN

(L-R) Alina Ibragimova will perform Bach in two late-night Proms; Thierry Escaich will take to the
Royal Albert Hall organ with an all-Bach programme; and Yo-Yo Ma performs Bach’s six cello suites
The BBC Proms season is particularly rich
in early music offerings this year, with
star names mixing with up-and-coming
performers. Highlights include Alina
Ibragimova performing J. S. Bach’s sonatas
and partitas for solo violin in consecutive
MICHAEL O’NEILL
at the Royal Albert Hall (23 August), and
the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
perform Brahms (1 September). The
Cardinall’s Musick’s Proms Chamber
Music concert on 20 July juxtaposes the
music of Tallis with Cheryl Frances-
HERTFORDSHIRE
St Albans will welcome Austrian baroque
ensemble Orchester Wiener Akademie
to the International Organ Festival this
summer, both as performers and as
important collaborators in the festival’s
organ competition. On 16 July the
orchestra will perform a programme
of music by Biber, Haydn and Mozart
in St Albans Cathedral, directed by
their founder Martin Haselböck; he
also performs as organ soloist with
violinist Ilia Korol. The following day,
Haselböck directs the orchestra for the
finals of the interpretation prize in the
organ competition, performing Handel
organ concertos with the finalists.
www.organfestival.com;
www.wienerakademie.at

late-night Proms (31 July, 1 August), and
further witching-hour Bach concerts by
Yo-Yo Ma, who plays the six cello suites
(5 September), and András Schiff with
the Goldberg Variations (22 August). (All
of these will be recorded for subsequent
TV broadcast.) Alice Coote gives a
Handel recital with the English Concert
(3 September), French organist Thierry
Escaich performs an all-Bach programme
MEINRAD HOFER
Hoad’s ‘Homage to Tallis’, before ending
with the former’s Spem in alium; and Sir
John Eliot Gardiner directs Monteverdi’s
Orfeo with the Monteverdi Choir and
English Baroque Soloists (4 August), and
symphonies by Beethoven and Berlioz
with the Orchestre Révolutionnaire et
Romantique (9 August).
All details correct at time of press;
www.bbc.co.uk/proms

BACH COMES HOME TO LEIPZIG

BACH-ARCHIV LEIPZIG

One of the most valuable artifacts
related to J. S. Bach has been given to
the Bach-Archiv in Leipzig, where the
composer spent the majority of his
working life. The famous portrait of
Bach by Elias Gottlob Haussmann is the
only image of the composer proven to
have been painted from life, and was
bequeathed to the archive by American
philanthropist Dr William H. Scheide
on the occasion of his 100th birthday,
shortly before his death in November
last year. Sir John Eliot Gardiner, in
whose family home the portrait resided
during the second world war and who
grew up around it, said that it was ‘both
poignant and fitting … to witness its
return to Leipzig’; he will present the
painting to the public for the first time
on 12 June.
In other news, the BachFest Leipzig
has awarded the 2015 Bach Medal to
conductor and organist Peter Neumann,
for his long association with the
composer’s music through his work
with his ensembles Kölner Kammerchor
and Collegium Cartusianum.
www.bach-leipzig.de

6 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com

EMTJJA15_006-009_R_News.indd 6 14/05/2015 18:28:53

 News

Moonen features in pro-immigrant campaign

Nicolette Moonen, violinist and founder
and director of the Bach Players, has
been chosen as one of 15 faces in a poster
campaign created by the Movement
Against Xenophobia (right). The posters,
which are being used in railway and
underground stations across the country,
are intended to tackle the negative image
of immigrants in the UK.
Inspired to join the campaign by
the natural horn player Anneke Scott,
Moonen said she liked the positive stance
of the posters. ‘The word “immigrant”
has become a toxic, negative word
recently. This campaign shows 15
immigrants from different countries,
continents, different ethnicities and
from various walks of life. It shows how
immigrants are part of the fabric of
our society.’
Moonen performed alongside the
comedian Prince Abdi, from Somalia,
at the campaign launch at the TUC
headquarters. She said: ‘I was one of the
first foreigners in the early music field to
move to Britain and settle here, coming
from Holland in 1992.
‘Many more have come since, often first
as students,’ Moonen says. ‘The world
of early music and of classical music in
general would look very different if all
the immigrants went home’.
www.iamanimmigrant.net/nicolette-moonen;
www.facebook.com/MovementAgainstXenophobia

Rachel Podger wins RAM Bach Prize

Violinist and director Rachel Podger

Wouter Jansen
has become the first woman to win
the Royal Academy of Music’s Bach
Prize. The prize, which is supported
by the Kohn Foundation, is awarded
annually to an individual ‘who has
made an outstanding contribution to
the performance and/or scholarly study
of the music of Johann Sebastian Bach’;
previous winners include Christoph
Wolff, Peter Schreier, John Butt,
Masaaki Suzuki and Ton Koopman.

New president for REMA Spitalfields

Xavier Vandamme, director of the
Music Summer
Festival
remke spijkers

Utrecht Early Music Festival, has been

elected president of the European
Early Music Network (REMA – Réseau
Européen de Musique Ancienne), in
succession to Peter Pontvik, director
of the Stockholm Early Music
Festival. Praising his predecessor’s
achievements – which include
initiating the annual European Day
of Early Music and the creation of
the web-radio station remaradio.eu –
Vandamme said that REMA ‘must be
first and foremost a place where one
can recharge one’s batteries and find
new inspiration’.
www.rema-eemn.net
La Nuova Musica and director
David Bates are associate artists at the
2015 Spitalfields Music Summer Festival,
performing three concerts across the
fortnight (2–16 June); these include
Handel’s Israel in Egypt, and a late-night
performance of Couperin’s Leçons de
ténèbres in the atmospheric surroundings
of Village Underground in Shoreditch.
Other artists appearing at the festival
include Stile Antico, the Sixteen, the
Carnival Band and the Armonico Consort.
www.spitalfieldsmusic.org.uk/whats-on/
summer-festival-2015

www.earlymusictoday.com june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 7

EMTJJA15_006-009_R_News.indd 7 14/05/2015 17:31:37

 News
obituaries: Denys Darlow
and Jennifer Ward Clarke
Two leading figures of the British
early music scene in the 1970s have
died. The cellist Jennifer Ward Clarke
originally trained on the modern
instrument, collaborating with
composers including Peter Maxwell
Davies and Harrison Birtwistle on
several premieres of their work; she
subsequently turned her attention to
the period instrument movement – one
of the first cellists so to do – and was
a founding member of Christopher
Hogwood’s Academy of Ancient
Halls goes on in Oregon
British conductor and harpsichordist
Matthew Halls has had his contract as
director of the Oregon Bach Festival –
which was founded in 1970, making
it one of the oldest in the US – extended
until 2020. This summer’s programme
includes performances by Masaaki
Jon Chrisopher MEYERS
Matthew Halls will remain at the Oregon Bach Festival until at least 2020
8 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_006-009_R_News.indd 8
Music, as well as playing under Roger
Norrington and Andrew Parrott.
Denys Darlow founded the London
Handel Festival in 1978, in his position
as organist at St George’s Hanover
Square, the composer’s parish church.
However, Darlow’s involvement with
early music had begun much earlier,
when he set up the Tilford Bach
Festival in 1952. He also taught at the
Royal College of Music, and conducted
the BBC Proms premiere of Handel’s
L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato.
Suzuki, Monica Huggett and
Helmuth Rilling, in music including
Bach’s Christmas Oratorio spread
over three performances, Haydn’s
Nelson Mass and Creation, and Arvo
Pärt’s Passio.
www.oregonbachfestival.com
Philip Pickett
jailed
Recorder player and conductor Philip
Pickett has been jailed for 11 years after
being found guilty of carrying out sexual
assaults on students at the Guildhall
School of Music & Drama. Pickett, who
taught at the conservatoire for over 20
years until the 1990s, was arrested in 2013
after former students came forward to
the police; he was found guilty on two
counts of rape and two counts of indecent
assault, but was cleared on six other
counts of indecent assault.
EUBO launches
new training
academy
The European Union Baroque Orchestra
and its nine partner organisations have
received funding from the European
Commission to launch a four-year co-
operation project aimed at nurturing
European talent and devising innovative
performance practices. The EUBO
Mobile Baroque Academy will run two
residential courses for students this
summer, which may lead to participation
in the main orchestra.
www.eubo.eu
New English
Concert Fellows
The English Concert in America, the
organisation that supports the work
of the ensemble in the US, has
announced the second annual English
Concert American Fellows. Viola player
Kyle Miller, cellist Caroline Nicolas
and lutenist Kevin Payne will each
receive an annual grant and career
guidance from members of the English
Concert, whose artistic director Harry
Bicket commented that ‘the TECA
Fellowship is a natural extension of
the English Concert’s commitment to
nurturing the next generation of early
music performers’.
www.englishconcert.co.uk/tcea
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 17:31:57
 News

Gluck heads to
Hayley Madden

St Andrews
The first Scottish production of Gluck’s
Iphigenia in Tauris in nearly 20 years
is taking place at Byre Opera in
St Andrews. Michael Downes, director
of music at the University of St Andrews
and artistic director of the Byre Theatre,
will conduct a cast of university students
and young professionals, as well as period
instrument ensemble Ars Eloquentiae and

Handel in the city the Fitzwilliam Quartet.

www.st-andrews.ac.uk/music
A three-year educational project led by the work, entitled Il Pastorale, l’Urbano e il

Brook Street Band reaches its finale this
summer with the premiere of an oratorio
inspired by Handel’s L’Allegro, il Penseroso
ed il Moderato. Composer Matthew King
and librettist Alasdair Middleton drew
inspiration from the lives of some of the
150 children – from schools in Haringey,
London and in Suffolk – who will be
taking part in the performance of the new
Benjamin Harte
Suburbano, which will take place in Snape
Maltings on 10 July.
Tatty Theo, founder and artistic director
of the Brook Street Band said: ‘Handel
has a real genius for expressing emotion.
Presented in this way his music has an
almost effortless ability to transcend
continents, centuries and generations.’ The Fitzwilliam Quartet will feature in
Byre Opera’s Gluck production
www.brookstreetband.co.uk

Entente cordiale à York

The York Early Music Festival, one of
Europe’s leading early music events, is
celebrating the 300-year period of Anglo-
French music-making between the battle
of Agincourt in 1415 and the death of
Louis XIV of France in 1715. Notable
groups include the Clerks, the Huelgas
Ensemble and the Taverner Consort, and
there will be recitals from such artists as
Andreas Staier and James Gilchrist. The
Orlando Consort will be performing a
newly devised soundtrack to the classic
1928 silent film La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc
(see page 30 to learn more), and the festival
will be rounded off by the final of the
International Young Artists Competition.
See listings (pages 46–52) for more details of
this year’s lineup; www.ncem.co.uk/yemf

Winners of 2015’s NCEM Young Composers

Award announced
The winners of the 2015 NCEM Young
Composers Award, tasked this year with
creating a new setting for a short dramatic
scene from Monteverdi’s Orfeo or
Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda,
have been announced as 16-year-old
Joshua Urben and 25-year-old John
Goldie-Scot.
Seven finalists were invited to the
NCEM in York on 14 May for a workshop
led by composer Christopher Fox. The
finalists’ works were performed for a
public audience that evening in front of the
competition’s judging panel comprising
NCEM’s director Delma Tomlin, BBC
Radio 3’s senior music producer Les Pratt,
and Dunedin Consort’s director John Butt.
Urben won the 18 and under category
with his composition Fractos Corde,
inspired by the storyline of Eurydice being
dragged down to the underworld; music
teacher Goldie-Scot won the 19 to 25
years category with Why are you in such a
hurry?, telling the story of a fight between
Clorinda and Tancredi.
The pair’s works will be premiered
by the Dunedin Consort in concert in
Glasgow on 2 October; the performance
will be recorded for BBC Radio 3’s
Early Music Show to be broadcast on
1 November.
The concert performance was streamed live and Winners: Joshua Urben (left) and John Goldie-
will be available to watch online until 14 June Scot (right) take the top prizes at NCEM’s
Young Composers Award
at www.ncem.co.uk/composersaward2015.

www.earlymusictoday.com june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 9

EMTJJA15_006-009_R_News.indd 9 18/05/2015 10:47:42

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 Radio Notes
’Tis the summer festival season once
more – Lucie Skeaping looks ahead
to some of the upcoming highlights
on the Early Music Show
It’s June – and that means festival time! These summer musical
get-togethers are always a time for special celebration, an
opportunity to spotlight the finest musicians performing before
large and appreciative audiences, and this year is no exception.
The festival at Aldeburgh is of course primarily associated
with the music of its founder, Benjamin Britten, and his friends
and successors. But Britten relished early music, from that of the
Tudors and of Purcell and his contemporaries, through to the
great works of Haydn and Mozart. And if he were alive today
he undoubtedly would have been happy to welcome to his
homemade festival Ensemble Organum, founded over 30 years
ago by Marcel Pérès. The music in which Pérès and his singing
sextet specialise is very early: we’re talking Gregorian chant, late
medieval monastic plainsong or, if you like, the liturgical music
of the very early Renaissance. At its best it’s simple, beautiful
and unadorned, yet deeply spiritual in both intent and impact;
you can hear them on the wireless on 28 June.
In Britain, perhaps our most famous early music festival is
that at York. Dating back to the 1970s, it was very much in the
vanguard of the early music revival and, as always, director
Delma Tomlin and her team have managed to attract top
performers. This year the Early Music Show devotes two
programmes to the festival: on 26 July we’ll hear the finalists
and winners of the International Young Artists Competition
strut their stuff, and on 5 July, we’re live (and hopefully
kicking) as a steady stream of musicians pops in to the city’s
National Centre for Early Music to chat with me and perform
a few tasters. Those who’ve signed up so far include
conductor of the Early Opera Company Christian Curnyn, and
Kati Debretzeni, Mahan Esfahani and Richard Boothby –
otherwise known as Entente Cordiale – who’ll be giving us
highlights from their two festival concerts.
If you read this column last quarter, you’ll remember that I
previewed ‘The Jew without the Yellow Badge’, about composer
and violinist Salamone Rossi who, in spite of his religion,
managed to make a successful career at the court of Mantua
from 1587 for some 41 years. Living and working among
talented colleagues including Gastoldi and Monteverdi, Rossi
honed his own madrigal skills while pioneering instrumental
music in his ‘Sinfonie e Gagliarde’ which contains what could
be dubbed the very first trio sonatas. Now rescheduled for
14 June (the management reserves the right etc), the programme
features some lovely music including Rossi’s settings from the
Song of Solomon and his variations on the popular dance tune
‘Ruggiero’ performed with great panache by Hespèrion XXI.
Diarize, tune in – and have a lovely summer.
www.bbc.co.uk/radio3/earlymusicshow
All broadcast details correct at time of press.
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_011_R_Radio and Up Coming.indd 11
coming
bojan čičić
When I met Bojan Čičić he was fresh from having tea with the
Croatian ambassador to the UK. In the 16th and 17th centuries
his home country Croatia – particularly the coastal regions of
Dalmatia and Istria – was caught between the musical cultures
of Venice and Vienna. Čičić wants to explore this rich musical
heritage by making a disc with his group Suonar Cantando,
possibly with funding from the embassy, which would include
works by composers from the region such as Michele Stratico
and Luka Sorkočević.
A solo violinist and a regular leader of many distinguished
ensembles such as the Academy of Ancient Music, Florilegium
and La Nuova Musica, Čičić only recently founded Suonar
Cantando. Together they have already toured to Belgium,
Holland and Croatia, giving concerts exploring the mixture of
influences that make his home country’s musical tradition
unique. This spring Čičić performed as leader and soloist in the
Telemann violin concerto with the Budapest Festival Orchestra
in Hungary, and this coming November he is touring in a
similar capacity with the Academy of Ancient Music in
Cambridge and London.
His passion for the music of the early 17th century began at
Zagreb University’s Academy of Music, where he fondly
remembers passing Reinhard Goebel’s recording of the Biber
Rosary Sonatas from friend to friend. Then, at the Royal Academy
of Music in London, he was part of a group called the Rare
Theatricall which explored 17th-century English stage music.
Carrying that thrill of discovery into his present projects, Čičić
is currently researching a programme for the Utrecht Early Music
Festival in the Boughton House library in Northamptonshire.
‘Personal effort in finding new repertoire is much more valuable
than just going on Spotify and picking music that way.’
In the course of his research Čičić has noted that British musical
tastes in terms of repertoire haven’t necessarily changed that
much since the 1730s – even then the musical diet was primarily
Corelli, Handel and Geminiani concerti grossi. He sees relatively
unknown composers such as Carbonelli as the untapped heritage
of British music.
So in creating programmes,
he is more interested in what he
calls ‘full discovery’ – the first
interpretation of a piece in the
modern era. Composers such as
David Foulis and Giuseppe
Agus are soon to reach new
audiences in this way.
www.bojancicic.com
NICHOLAS BOWN
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 11
18/05/2015 09:57:54
Introducing Rhinegold TV: the brand new home
of exciting and engaging content produced by
Rhinegold and their carefully selected partners.
Content includes:
» World-class performances from Rhinegold LIVE, including
Julian Lloyd Webber, Mary Bevan and Andrew Litton
» High-quality CPD sessions from Music Education Expo
» In-depth interviews with leading performers and conductors
through our partnership with Living the Classical Life

EXPLORE IT FOR YOURSELF AT

RHINEGOLD.CO.UK/TV
 UNSUNG HEROES
HISTORICAL RE-ENACTORS
Boleyn’s emblem, the white Falcon
I direct costumed early music ensemble
Passamezzo, specialising in 16th- and
17th-century English music. I am
interested in placing early music in its
context, so although we give many
conventional concerts, we also play in
a variety of other settings: in stately
homes, palaces, theatres, museums,
gardens and ruins throughout the
country; for historic dancers here in
England, and in France, Belgium and the
Czech Republic; and with Sufi musicians
in Morocco.
In view of all the publicity
surrounding the RSC and BBC
productions of Wolf Hall, it seemed
appropriate to write about Passamezzo’s
own dalliances with the story of Anne
Boleyn. In autumn 2013, we were invited
to provide music for the Lord Mayor’s
Show by Clio’s Company, a theatre-in-
education company who creates site-
specific historical plays, and I have
played in many of their productions.
They wanted to create an event based on
Anne Boleyn’s coronation, and had
come across an account written by John
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_013_R_Unsung Heroes.indd 13
Leland and Nicholas Udall, giving a
picture of the celebrations as the queen
rode through London to her coronation
at Westminster Abbey in 1533. Among
other things, it describes a ‘pageant of
St Anne’ written by Udall and which
was performed before the queen at
Cornhill. When this is ended, it says:
Then at the departing of the Queenes said
Grace was songen this balad following
This white Falcon rare and gaison,
This bird shyneth so bright,
Of all that ar no bird compare
Maye with this Falcon whight.
The vertues all no man mortall
Of this bird may write;
Noo man earthely ynough truely
Can prease this Falcon whight.
Ballads were popular throughout the
16th century, and the same tune might
be used for many different sets of words,
so when I was asked to help Clio’s
Company prepare their presentation of
Anne Boleyn’s coronation, and seeing
this song about a white falcon (Anne’s
emblem) described as a ‘balad’, I started
to look for a popular melody that
matched the metre of the song.
The melody that seemed most
appropriate to me was ‘And I war a
maydn’, an anonymous song from
Henry VIII’s reign, which is found in
Bm Add 31922, more commonly known
as Henry VIII’s manuscript. It begins:
And I war a maydn
As many one ys,
for all the golde in England
I wold not do amysse.
Although the melody is only found
in Henry VIII’s manuscript, where it is
set in five parts, there are three other
references to it in manuscripts dating
from the late-15th to the mid-16th
centuries.
The earliest mention of the melody is
in a late 15th-century collection of carol
and song lyrics, in the song of ‘Swet
Jhesus is cum to vs’, which is headed
‘A song in the tune of and I were a
maydn etc’. There are 21 verses – here is
the first verse to give an idea of form:
Swet Jhesus is cum to vs
This good tym of Crystmas;
Wherfor with prays syng we always,
Welcum owr Messyas.
Hey, now, now, now.
Where ‘And I war a maydn’ repeats
the last two lines, the burden ‘Hey now,
now, now’ can be sung to fill this bit of
music. The metre of this particular
ballad matches the ‘white Falcon’ words
almost exactly. There are two other
references to this ballad tune – one in a
set of household accounts from Henry
VIII’s time, and another in a play dating
from 1560. This is enough to show that it
was a popular ballad tune, and one that
would have been known in the 1530s, so
when I saw the ‘white Falcon’ song
described as a ballad, and its metre
fitting the melody so well, it seemed the
logical choice to put the two together.
For the Lord Mayor’s Show, Clio’s
Company constructed a float with a vast
model of the white falcon. Performers
dressed as Anne Boleyn and her ladies
sat around the model, while actors and
children accompanied by costumed
shawm players performed the song for
what was probably the first time in more
than 400 years.
TAMSIN LEWIS
HARALD JOERGENS
Clio’s Company at 2013’s Lord Mayor’s Show
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 13
14/05/2015 13:53:50
 COMPETITIONS
Keep up to date with the latest winners and deadlines of early music competitions across the globe
RESULTS
HANDEL SINGING
COMPETITION
Baritone Josep-Ramon Olivé has been
awarded both the Regina Etz prize for
first place and the Michael Normington
audience prize at the 2015 Handel
Singing Competition, part of the London
Handel Festival. Born in Barcelona in
1988, Olivé began his studies in his native
Catalunya before moving to London in
2013 to study at the Guildhall School of
Music & Drama.
Russian mezzo-soprano Maria
Ostroukhova was placed second, winning
the Michael Oliver prize, while Ingrida
Gápová, Sarah Hayashi and Alice Privett
received the Selma D and Leon Fishbach
memorial awards for finalists. In addition
to winning prizes of £5,000 and £2,000
respectively, Olivé and Ostroukhova
will both appear in recital at the 2016
London Handel Festival.
IV INTERNATIONAL
GIULIO PEROTTI
SINGING COMPETITION
Details The fourth edition of the
competition, which recognises and
celebrates German tenor Giulio Perotti
(1841–1901), returns following a break in
2014. The competition consists of three
rounds: selections, semi-final and the final.
All pieces should be performed in their
original language.
Eligibility The competition is open to
singers born between 1 January 1990 and
31 December 1999 (group A), but also to
students of solo singing at a music academy
in any country (group B) regardless of age.
Singers who have completed their studies
and work in the profession are not eligible
for entry.
Deadline 30 June 2015.
Competition dates 23–29 October 2015.
Location Ueckermünde, Germany.
Prizes Grand prize – €2,500; groups A and B:
first prize – €400; second prize – €300;
14 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015
EMTJJA15_014_R_Competitions.indd 14
Handel Singing Competition first-prize winner
Josep-Ramon Olivé
UPCOMING DEADLINES
third prize – €200; special prizes – €150.
Contact perotti@ueckermuende.de
Web www.internationaler-perotti-
gesangswettbewerb.de
FOURTH ROSALYN TURECK
INTERNATIONAL BACH
COMPETITION FOR YOUNG
PIANISTS
Details The competition provides an
opportunity for young pianists to perform
the music of Johann Sebastian Bach and
contemporary works. The competition’s
repertoire consists of eight categories:
category I – short preludes, preludes and
fugues, fantasies; category II – inventions,
sinfonias, duets; category III – well-tempered
clavier; category IV – suites, partitas, French
overture; category V – various works;
category VI – chromatic fantasy and fugue,
Italian concerto, sonatas, toccatas; category
VII – recital category up to 50 minutes: Bach
works, plus a transcription by Busoni,
Brahms, Liszt and others; category VIII –
INTERNATIONAL H. I. F. BIBER
COMPETITION
The Biber competition exists to
encourage young ensembles to explore
Austrian baroque music; the 2015
competition was held between 30 April
and 3 May. The Heinrich Ignaz Franz
Biber prize for the best overall
performance was given to Ensemble
Prisma – made up of Elisabeth
Champollion (recorder), Franciska
Anna Hajdu (violin), Dávid Budai
(viola da gamba) and Alon Sariel (lute).
The Franz Joseph Aumann prize for new
discoveries in baroque music went to
Ensemble Zeitgeist, whose members are
Klaus Haidl (archlute and baroque
guitar), Magdalena Kelz (cello), Johanna
Kargl and Barbara Danzer (both violin).
Recorder player Claudia Molon was
awarded the Romanus Weichlein prize
for the advancement of Austrian baroque
music; each of the three prizes came
with a €1,500 award.
Goldberg variations. A jury will select 40
competitors for the eight categories.
Eligibility Applicants to categories I to VI
must have been born between 1 November
1995 and 28 October 2008. Category VII is
open to contestants aged 16–19, born
between 1 November 1996 and 28 October
1999. Category VIII is open to contestants
aged 16–20, born between 1 November
1995 and 28 October 1999.
Deadline 1 July 2015.
Competition dates 28 October–
1 November 2015: 28–30 October,
semi-finals; 31 October, finals;
1 November, gala winners concert.
Location New York.
Prizes Category I – $250; category II –
$350; category III – $600; category IV –
first place $800, second place $600,
third place $500; category V – $800;
category VI – $800; category VII – $1,000;
category VII – $1,500.
Contact tureckbach@aol.com
Web www.tureckbachcompetition.com
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 14:06:29

THE BACH PLAYERS
Familiarity breeds audiences, so it’s no
surprise that many ensembles pack in
the favourites to pull in the crowds. But
the Bach Players, who celebrate their
20th anniversary next year, have
positioned themselves at the other end
of the spectrum, and attract their fans
through programmes of the unknown.
Their recording ‘An Italian in Paris’,
for example, features not only the
familiar names of Couperin and Marin
Marais but also the little-known
Élisabeth Jacquet de la Guerre, in the
year of the 350th anniversary of her
birth. In July, ‘The Seasons’ predictably
brings along Vivaldi’s Summer, but also
works by Chédeville, Farina and Guido.
It’s an approach which artistic director
Nicolette Moonen believes works well.
‘It’s about context,’ she says. ‘We all hear
so much Bach, for example, but rather
than keeping him on a pedestal,
audiences are interested to hear him
in context, to understand what was
going on around him.’
The ensemble’s most recent CD ‘Bach
and his rivals’ – available on their own
Hyphen Press music label – presents two
sets of cantatas by three composers
(Telemann, Graupner and Bach himself)
and includes works written for the same
Sunday, 30 January 1724. ‘It paints a
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EMTJJA15_015_R_Artist Focus.indd 15
ARTIST FOCUS
substantial picture of music in Germany
at that specific moment,’ says Moonen.
The group varies in size from just
three musicians to 25, specialising in
programmes of 17th- and 18th-century
music, playing on original instruments
and singing in the original language.
Moonen, a violinist, founded the
ensemble in 1996 after moving to
When you come
to hear us I want you
to have a convivial
shared experience
London from Holland, and finding the
city somewhat lacking in performances
of Bach cantatas, especially when
compared with her homeland.
‘I don’t really blame a lot of audiences
for feeling uncomfortable with the
formality of concerts here,’ she says.
‘When you come to hear us I want you
to have a convivial shared experience, so
our concerts are lively, informal events
in which we engage with the audience.
We don’t walk on formally, for example,
and children get to sit at the front and
we talk about what we are performing.’
They have regular concerts series in
London at St John’s, Downshire Hill in
Hampstead and at the Octagon Chapel
in Norwich, as well as conducting UK
and European tours. ‘We have quite a
following in our regular venues with
people coming from the other end of the
country to hear us. We want them to feel
welcome when they arrive so that’s why
we perform in-the-round to help people
feel part of what we do. I’ve learnt a lot
from jazz so you can take a drink in with
you, you can talk to us in the interval,
and the programmes have a story. This
doesn’t mean the listening is
compromised, but when people feel
comfortable they are open to being
intellectually stimulated and emotionally
touched by the music.’
And for the future, as well as
continuing the crusade on introducing
audiences to unknown composers,
Moonen is on a quest for another
occasional venue … Custodians of quiet
London churches, please get in touch.
The Bach Players will perform at the
Octagon Chapel, Norwich on 16 July
and St John’s Downshire Hill, Hampstead
on 18 July; www.thebachplayers.org.uk.
RHIAN MORGAN
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 15
14/05/2015 14:08:30
 LETTER FROM ABROAD
GÖTTINGEN
Dear EMT,
Cities where a
composer was born
or worked have
long celebrated
and promoted
Adrian Horsewood their musical
writes from Göttingen progeny: think of
Warsaw’s warmth
for Chopin, or Mozart-mania in Salzburg.
Johann Sebastian Bach has the annual
BachFest in Leipzig, and Handel is well
served by festivals in Halle (his birthplace)
and London (home for the last 47 years of
his life).
Handel’s appeal has long been
widespread, however, and not confined to
those two cities. For 28 years the
Cambridge Handel Opera Group
presented biennial performances of the
composer’s stage works under the
direction of university lecturer Andrew
Jones, until his retirement in 2013 brought
this wonderful venture to a close. In
another university town, however, another
long-running Handel festival goes from
strength to strength.
Göttingen lies quietly in Lower Saxony,
about 100km south of Hanover, with a
population of just under 120,000; its
university was founded in 1734 and along
with its sister establishment at Tübingen
enjoys a status not dissimilar to that of
Oxford and Cambridge – alumni and
former members of faculty at Göttingen
include Heinrich Heine, the Brothers
Grimm, mathematicians Gauss, Hilbert
and Riemann, and physicists Planck,
Oppenheimer and Heisenberg.
However, in 1920 – two years before
the festival in Halle was established –
Göttingen was the location for one of the
first performances of a Handel stage
work in over 150 years, when Oskar
Hagen presided over Rodelinda. Since
then, the festival has grown into a
fortnight-long celebration, with concerts
and numerous other events (film
screenings, lectures, walking tours, school
workshops) taking place all over the town;
indeed, one of the great joys of visiting
Göttingen is that its compact size allows
one to stroll from one event to another. Jacquet de la Guerre and Charpentier, and
The festival has had a number of I also caught performances by baroque
distinguished musical directors, including harpist Margret Köll, and soprano
Fritz Lehmann, John Eliot Gardiner and Carolyn Sampson.
Nicholas McGegan. The incumbent, While always refusing to rest on their
Laurence Cummings, started at Göttingen laurels, Cummings and Wolff have their
in 2011, and together with Intendant sights set on the festival’s 100th
(managing director) Tobias Wolff has built anniversary in 2020, when they will
impressively on the work of his celebrate each of Handel’s operas having
predecessors. been performed at the festival. With its
The 2015 festival had as its theme dedication to up-and-coming performers,
‘Heroines!’, but defining what constitutes its links with the community, and its
a heroine is no easy matter, given the world-class performances, Göttingen is a
breadth of characters which Handel vibrant, thriving example of how a music
painted in his works. Thus, Agrippina – festival should be.
empress of Rome, who installed her son
Nero on the throne only then to be exiled ADRIAN HORSEWOOD
and assassinated by him – is
undoubtedly ‘a strong
woman’, as Cummings and Göttingen fest
Wolff contend, albeit with St Petri Kircheival venue
murky and cut-throat
intentions; but so then, too,
is Theodora, even if her
strength lies in her
courage and her passive
resistance. While I missed
the performance of the
latter, the sparkling
production of Agrippina
by Laurence Dale – who
compared the plot to an
episode of Dallas – was
thrillingly performed,
with mezzo-soprano
Ulrike Schneider
enthralling in the title
role and Cummings
leading the
FestspielOrchester
Göttingen in the pit.
Cummings and
Wolff also seized the
chance to invite some
of the leading female
performers of our
time to this year’s
festival; mezzo-
soprano Sarah
Connolly gave a
blazing gala recital
of music by
Handel, Élisabeth

www.earlymusictoday.com JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 17

EMTJJA15_017_R_Letter from abroad.indd 17 14/05/2015 14:12:00

 GETTING STARTED
Baroque violin –
part two: the later baroque
Oliver Webber, director of the Monteverdi String Band, gives part two of his guide,
looking at the period 1650–1750
HOLDING THE VIOLIN
AND BOW
In 1741, Venetian artist Pietro Longhi
painted three violinists around a table,
each holding his instrument in a
different way: this nicely illustrates the
oft-cited maxim that there are as many
playing methods as teachers!
If you prefer to use your chin, you
will need to get used to the absence of
a shoulder rest. Many historical forms
of dress were bulkier and obviate the
problem; for us, a piece of chamois
leather can add the necessary padding
and friction.
Playing without the chin, either on
the collarbone or below, requires
patience and commitment, but offers
great freedom of movement and
comfort. You can find exercises for this
at www.margreet.ch/Workshops_
exercises.html.
The bow can be held in at least two
ways: with the thumb on the stick, a
little distance from the frog, or with the
thumb on the hair. The latter method is
often associated with France, but was
widespread throughout most of Europe
until well into the 18th century, so it
might be more accurate to describe the
former as the ‘late-Italian’ grip. Each
has advantages and disadvantages, so
today’s historical specialist would do
well to be proficient in both. The
thumb-on-hair grip requires a lower
arm and wrist, and is better suited to
shorter bows.
Exercises like those in Leopold
Mozart’s Versuch (chapter 5) help
develop fine dynamic control, and
Geminiani’s example 24 from his
18 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015
EMTJJA15_018-019_R_Getting started.indd 18
treatise will teach precision with string-
crossing and faster bow strokes.
The best players pay close attention
to the precise shape of notes – not
overdoing the messa di voce (a special
effect for a long note), but grading
the way each note decays to find
the ideal balance between line and
rhetorical articulation.
STRINGING AND SET UP
Our understanding of historical
stringing has advanced greatly in the
last 20 years, and the compromises
accepted by previous generations are
no longer necessary. The ‘gold
standard’ of stringing was equal
tension with high-quality flexible
strings: a number of makers now offer
suitable strings.
As a beginner, it is no harder to play
on equal tension strings (with
substantially thicker lower strings), and
the results are a revelation, teaching us
much about the timbres, articulations
and blends that would have been
familiar to composers.
Wound strings were invented in the
mid-17th century; their uptake was
variable, and not firmly established
until the mid-18th century. Our period,
then, is one of overlap, and a wound
G string is one plausible option: choose
a historical type with thick core and
wire (not ribbon) winding, to blend
better with the gut D string.
If you are having an instrument
made or converted, talk to your luthier
about the set up: bridge, bass-bar and
soundpost all have a huge impact on
the sound and help to establish your
target soundworld, be it (say) Rome in
the 1680s or Germany in the 1720s.
NATIONAL STYLES
The briefest survey of early
20th-century recordings starkly reveals
the erosion of national and personal
styles in the last 100 years – imagine
how much more striking the
differences must have been two
centuries previously!
The stylistic poles of the baroque
were France and Italy: French violinists
were elegant, refined, quiet, meticulous
in ornamentation, and charming, their
demeanour formed by the dance, and
their instruments strung lightly;
the Italians were virtuosic, daring,
dynamically extreme, outrageous in
ornamentation, and passionate. Their
model was the bravura singer, and
their instruments strung heavily and at
higher pitch. Don’t be afraid to revel in
their opposition!
ORNAMENTATION
One of the great delights of this era is
the huge role played by ornamentation:
the briefest study of other baroque
artforms should leave no doubt about
this. We are at something of a
disadvantage compared with 17th- and
18th-century musicians, who learned it
as part of their musical training,
especially as it is best transmitted from
teacher to student. Thankfully, there
are many sources to help us, from
tables in treatises to manuscripts of
complete embellished Adagios.
‘Essential’ ornamentation, associated
especially with France, includes
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 15:47:36
 appoggiaturas, trills, mordents, turns,
and every kind of ornament that could
be represented by a symbol. Be
inventive: Geminiani offers 15 types of
trill. Florid, improvised ornamentation
was expected in Italian slow
movements, and contemporary
examples include elaborate flourishes,
chromaticism and even chords. The
former can be practiced on scales,
while an excellent way into florid
ornamentation is to learn and transpose
the original examples, to get a feel for
the figures and how to apply them.
Sources
Reading historical sources should be a
continual chain of discovery. Bear in
mind the intended reader – amateur or
professional, general or specialist - and
don’t be surprised by the diversity of
opinion you’ll find.
Finally, don’t just accept what you
hear from people like me! Read the
sources, experiment with the
equipment and learn what it does best.
Keep an open mind and allow yourself
to be surprised.
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_018-019_R_Getting started.indd 19
Primary sources
Italy
• Compendio Musicale, Bartolomeo
Bismantova (1677)
• Regole, Giuseppe Tartini (1771 –
but written much earlier)
France
• Méthode Facile, Michel Pignolet de
Montéclair (1711)
• L’école d’Orphée, Michel Corrette (1738)
Germany
• Florilegia, Georg Muffat (1695 and 1698)
• Versuch, Joseph Joachim Quantz (1752)
• Versuch, Leopold Mozart (1756)
England
• The Gentleman’s Diversion, John Lenton
(1693)
• The Art of Playing on the Violin,
Francesco Geminiani (1751)
Many of these are available in the Anne
Fuzeau facsimile series; some can be found
on IMSLP.
Secondary sources
Ornamentation
• 18th-century variations for Corelli’s
Sonatas, op. 5, Robert E Seletsky (Early
Music, 119–132, Feb 1996)
• Ornaments for Corelli’s violin sonatas, Neal
Zaslaw (Early Music, 95–118, Feb 1996)
Bows
• New light on the old bow (1 and 2); Newer
light on the old bow; Still newer light on the
old bow, Robert E Seletsky (Early Music,
May, Aug, Nov 2004, Feb 2009)
• Baroque Bows Hans Reiners (www.bows-
viols.de/index_eng.htm)
Strings
• Real Gut Strings: Some New Experiments in
Historical Stringing, Oliver Webber (The
Consort, Vol. 55, p3–29, summer 1999)
If you buy just one book, this presents the
primary source evidence on every topic
with clear, practical analysis: Baroque String
Playing for Ingenious Learners, Judy Tarling
(Corda Music, third edition, June 2013).
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 19
18/05/2015 12:23:40
 BREMF 2015 celebrates Women
through the ages – as composers,
performers, inspirational characters,
muses and symbols. Highlights include
Joglaresa, The London Handel
Players, Emma Kirkby & Jakob
Lindberg, and a new production
of Francesca Caccini’s 1625 opera
La Liberazione di Ruggiero.

Tickets on sale from September. For full programme details or to

join the mailing list go to bremf.org.uk or call 01273 833746

BREMF15 Music Today 14May15 v3.indd 1 14/05/2015 12:05

OMNIA Cambridge Early Music

VANITAS CONCERTS SUMMER 2015
31.07 – 09.08 Fantasticus
2015 Sunday 21 June, 3.00pm
Buxtehude, Bertali, Schmelzer,
Pandolfi Mealli and Jenkins
EARLY MUSIC IN BRUGES
Students of the Baroque
Summer School
Saturday 8 August, 7.30pm
J. S. Bach B Minor Mass (excerpts)

Emma Kirkby & Philomel

Jakob Lindberg
Sunday 12 July, 3.00pm
Dowland, D’India, Purcell,
Ferrabosco and more
The Parley of
Instruments
Sunday 2 August, 4.00pm
J. S. Bach and his Circle
Dunedin Consort
The Parley of
Ensemble Correspondances Instruments
B’Rock Wednesday 5 August, 8.00pm
Beeld © Athos Burez
Sunday 9 August, 4.00pm
Cantare, Sonare e Ballare
The Intrepid Academy
Wednesday 12 August, 8.00pm
Il Divino e Sacro Collegio
Students of the
Renaissance Summer
School
Friday 14 August, 7.30pm
A musical Grand Tour of the city
states of 16th-century Italy

J. S. Bach Brandenburg Concerto

Natacha Kudritskaya No.2 Stile Antico
Jean Rondeau Saturday 15 August, 7.30pm
Capriccio Stravagante www.mafestival.be Music for Compline
Image © Marco Borggreve

Box Office 01223 847330 www.CambridgeEarlyMusic.org

 FESTIVALS PREVIEW
GREGYNOG FESTIVAL AND THREE CHOIRS FESTIVAL
ASH MILLS
Geraint Bowen rehearsing
with Three Cathedral Choirs
for TCF
Gregynog Hall, a spectacular black-and-
white mansion buried in the Welsh
countryside near Newtown, Powys, has
been a centre for the arts since it was
bought by sisters Margaret and
Gwendoline Davies in 1920. Their
intention was to enrich the lives of the
people of Wales in the aftermath of the
first world war, and in 1933 they
established the classical music festival
which still flourishes at Gregynog. In
recent years artistic director Rhian Davies
has refined Gregynog Festival’s focus, with
a single annual theme drawn from the
history of the hall and the surrounding
area, and a strong early music programme
featuring high-profile artists.
This year’s theme is ‘Révolution’, and
the early music performances are clustered
around 18 June – the 200th anniversary of
the Battle of Waterloo. Border towns
around Gregynog housed significant
colonies of Napoleonic prisoners of war on
parole during the early 19th century;
many of them later fought and died at
Waterloo and the festival programming
highlights some of their stories.
Repertoire and artists are predominantly
French and performers making their
Welsh debut appearances include
harpsichordist Christophe Rousset, with
his ensemble Les Talens Lyriques, and
fortepianist Kristian Bezuidenhout, both
appearing on 22 June. Other performers
include Fantasticus (17 June), London
Handel Players with French baroque
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_021_R_Festival preview.indd 21
dance specialists Mary Collins and Steven
Player (18 June), Revolutionary Drawing
Room with flautist Rachel Brown
(19 June), harpist Masumi Nagasawa and
Ensemble Amarillis (20 June) and Les
Folies françoises (21 June).
The Three Choirs Festival celebrates its
own 300th anniversary with a programme
that aims to reflect some of the musical
landmarks of the three centuries that have
passed since cathedral musicians from
Hereford, Gloucester and Worcester first
started getting together for annual ‘music
meetings’ that included secular concerts as
well as liturgical services. The artistic
director each year is the director of music
at the host cathedral, and 2015 supremo
Geraint Bowen of Hereford discovered
when he started researching repertoire
performed at the early festivals that most
of it was not worth resurrecting. However,
the 2015 opening service will feature
music by Purcell and Handel that was
frequently performed in the festival’s first
century, accompanied by the period
instruments of the Corelli Ensemble.
The highlight of the week for early
music fans is the first-ever visit to the
Three Choirs Festival by the Orchestra of
the Age of the Enlightenment, performing
Bach’s St Matthew Passion with the Three
Cathedral Choirs, conducted by Geraint
Bowen and featuring James Oxley as the
Evangelist and Matthew Brook as
Christus (28 July). Bach’s ‘Great 18’
chorale preludes are the focus of an organ
masterclass by Henry Fairs of
Birmingham Conservatoire (1 August),
and John Scott’s celebrity organ recital
includes the Passacaglia and Fugue in C
minor BWV 582 together with a festival
commission by Anthony Powers as part
of the Orgelbüchlein project, which aims
to complete the 118 missing pieces for
which Bach had sketched titles but never
wrote the music (31 July).
Vivaldi’s ‘The Cuckow’, which was a
particular favourite in England, is the
centrepiece of a concert by La Serenissima
subtitled ‘Europe in 1715’ (29 July), which
also features works by Dall’Abaco,
Bononcini, Valentini and Telemann.
Music by Gibbons, Morley and Purcell
will be included in Voces8’s tour of ‘Three
Centuries in One Afternoon’ (28 July); and
the Orlando Consort’s exploration of the
Requiem Mass ‘Dust and Ashes: Requiem
for 500 Years’ juxtaposes works by living
composers who have applied medieval
techniques in their music with
acknowledged masterpieces of medieval
times by composers such as Brumel,
Dufay and Ockeghem (27 July).
Gregynog Festival takes place 12–28 June in
and around Gregynog Hall, Tregynon, Powys,
with some events in Aberystwyth and Cardiff;
www.gregynogfestival.org.
The Three Choirs Festival takes place in
Hereford from 25 July to 1 August, with two
events in Leominster Priory; www.3Choirs.org.
CLARE STEVENS
Gregynog Hall,
the festival’s home
since 1933
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAY 21
14/05/2015 14:18:56
 The rather remarkable
John Smith
Don’t be fooled by the common name – Julian Perkins reveals how much there is to know
and appreciate about the work of Handel’s successor, John Christopher Smith
Andy Craggs
I
f through the clouds appear some
glimm’ring rays, they’re sparks he
caught from his great master’s
blaze!’ (David Garrick, prologue to
The Fairies, 1755).
Music assistants often have a poor
press. Franz Süssmayr is remembered
only for his infamous completion of
Mozart’s Requiem, while Robert Craft is
known largely for his role as Stravinsky’s
assistant. As Handel’s amanuensis, John
Christopher Smith has suffered a similar
fate. Moreover, confusion has prevailed
as to his identity: his father shared the
same commonplace names and was
Handel’s original amanuensis. (Both
father and son anglicised their names
from Johann Christoph Schmidt to John
Christopher Smith when they came to
England; here Smith’s father is referred to
by his original German surname to
differentiate the two.) Thus the omens for
Smith’s musical legacy were poor from
the start. Here we seek to reappraise
Smith the composer, whose music often
bubbles over with brilliance, wit and
charm – not to mention his irresistible
penchant for trills!
Born in Ansbach in 1712, the same year
as Frederick the Great, Smith came to
22 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_022-023_R_Composer Spotlight.indd 22
England aged eight. His father, one of
Handel’s contemporaries at the University
of Halle, had settled in London four years
earlier at the composer’s request. As
Handel’s amanuensis, Schmidt acted as
financial assistant, music publisher and
distributor, principal music copyist and
director of what was to become a
considerable team of scribes. In London,
his son made rapid musical progress with
esteemed teachers, and aged 20 published
his op.1, entitled ‘Suites de Pièces pour le
Clavecin’. The precocious Smith was
clearly indebted to Handel in copying the
title of his ‘Eight Great Suites’ of 1720, and
did so again for his op.2 in 1735.
Surprisingly, Smith’s op.3 appeared
only in 1755 when he was widowed aged
42. Little is known of his activities in the
preceding two decades other than a few
years spent travelling on the continent,
and it seems as if Smith was suffering the
lingering effects of tuberculosis. Op.3
perhaps forms part of his renaissance;
1755 marked not only his return to
keyboard publications after 20 years, but
also his re-entry to the theatre after a
similarly long absence. The legendary
actor David Garrick had invited Smith to
succeed composers such as Thomas Arne
and William Boyce in composing for the
Drury Lane Theatre. This first resulted in
The Fairies, an English opera concocted
from Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s
Dream, one of Smith’s most successful
works. The continental tour may have
reawakened Smith’s compositional muse,
and Handel’s incipient blindness perhaps
allowed his second amanuensis more
time for his own compositions than
would previously have been possible.
What we know about Smith is found
primarily in the Anecdotes of George
Frederick Handel and John Christopher Smith.
This pithy volume by William Coxe lauds
Smith’s playing as ‘singularly animated
and impressive’, while in character he is
described as ‘sincere, benevolent and
humane’ – although elsewhere, his
commercial rival Thomas Linley the elder
pejoratively calls him a ‘cunning man’.
Whatever the truth, Smith seems to have
had both a persuasive personality and
sharp business acumen. Following a
breach between his father and Handel
during the last years of the composer’s life,
he managed to effect a reconciliation
between them three weeks before Handel’s
death. The inheritance Smith received
from his father, who died four years after
Handel, included some of Handel’s
musical instruments and an enormous
collection of his music books and
manuscripts. Once Smith had used
Handel’s oratorios to compile his three
pasticcio oratorios – works assembled
from Handel’s music with some linking
recitatives by Smith himself – he gave
most of the manuscripts to George III in
what the Handel scholar Percy Young
described as ‘one of the epochal gestures
in musical history’. (They are now in the
British Library as part of the Royal Music
Library.) This may have ensured the
continuance of a handsome royal pension
that Smith seems to have received from
his harpsichord student, the Dowager
Princess of Wales, thus securing his
retirement.
As Handel’s amanuensis, Smith’s
contribution was considerably more
musical than that of his father. His
collaboration with John Stanley in
directing the annual Lenten performances
of Handel’s oratorios was central in
establishing Messiah as one of the most
loved and performed masterpieces of
western music. On his own terms, Smith
was possibly the most prolific London-
based composer for solo harpsichord of
his time. His five keyboard publications
proved popular and were issued several
www.earlymusictoday.com
18/05/2015 12:24:14
 Gerald Coke Handel Collection,
Foundling Museum
John Christopher Smith
times, and he was probably a sought-after
teacher. Following Handel’s death, he
forged a successful career as a vocal
composer and his output included ten
operas and nine oratorios (including the
three pasticcios).
Although the Oxford Dictionary of
National Biography describes Smith’s
music as ‘attractive, but undemanding’,
his keyboard compositions are often
highly virtuosic and evince Scarlattian
traits that Smith presumably learnt from
Thomas Roseingrave – the so-called ‘head
of the English cult of Domenico Scarlatti’.
Athletic hand crossings, unpredictable
figurations, sudden shifts from major to
minor keys and sequences built over
repeated left-hand chords vie with each
other to create music that is both
impressive and theatrical. This Anglo-
Scarlatti style has a playful character
which often compels the performer to
indulge in lavish ornamentation. Such
playfulness gives zest to this wonderfully
theatrical music, which reveals Smith as a
not unworthy successor to Handel.
May 2015 sees the release of Julian Perkins’
world-premiere solo harpsichord recording
of Smith’s op.3 harpsichord suites, ‘Smith &
Handel’, on Chandos Records (CHAN 0807).
The recording features a single-manual
harpsichord made by Mabyn and William
Bailey in London, c1770, and a double-manual
Franco-Flemish
harpsichord made
by Ferguson Hoey
in Oxford, 1982.
‘Smith and
Handel’ will be
reviewed in the
next issue of EMT.
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_022-023_R_Composer Spotlight.indd 23
J. C. Smith timeline
1712 –
Smith is born the second of four children in
Ansbach, Bavaria. His two younger sisters go
on to marry wind players who play for Handel,
while his brother is likely to have played the
percussion and trumpet for Handel. – 1716
Smith’s father comes to England to work as
Handel’s first amanuensis. He specialises in
1720 – Handel’s music and plays the viola in his
Smith comes to England and possibly attends orchestras, but is not known to have composed.
the prestigious Clare Academy in Soho Square.
– by 1725
Smith was probably having keyboard and
composition lessons with Handel. No doubt
Handel’s operatic exploits allowed him scant time
for young students (Smith may have been his only
student to become a professional musician), and
Smith’s main teachers were Johann Christoph
1732 – Pepusch and Thomas Roseingrave.
Aged only 20, Smith brings out the first of five
solo harpsichord publications. – 1739
Smith and his father show a social conscience in
being among the original subscribers to the Fund
for Decay’d Musicians (now the Royal Society of
1751 – Musicians). 
Smith returns to London at Handel’s request after
two or three years spent travelling around Europe. – 1754
Smith is appointed the first incumbent organist
at the Foundling Hospital chapel. He starts
collaborating with John Stanley in directing the
annual Lenten performances of Handel’s
1755 – oratorios that Handel had started in 1747.
Smith publishes The Fairies and his virtuosic op.3
harpsichord suites. The subscribers to op.3 include
not only Smith’s three illustrious teachers, but also
Charles Jennens, the Duchess of Newcastle and the
dedicatee of his op.1, Lady Walpole. – 1759
Handel dies at his home in Brook Street, London.
1760 – Smith succeeds him as the Royal Music Master.
George II dies and is succeeded by George III.
John Mainwaring brings out his groundbreaking
biography of Handel, written ‘under the
inspection of Mr Smith’. (This refers to Smith
jnr, though it seems likely that Smith snr also
contributed to the biography.)
c1760 –
Smith becomes artistic director of the
Covent Garden Royal Theatre. – 1763
Smith’s father dies, leaving him a vast inheritance
from Handel’s estate.
– c1763
Johann Zoffany paints Smith’s portrait. It is an
indication of Smith’s prominence that Zoffany
depicts him (Arne and possibly the infant Mozart
also came under his brush). Perhaps this attests
to Charles Burney’s galling statement that Smith
‘formed his character on models of a higher
class than that of a mere musician’.
1774 –
Smith buys a respectable town house in Bath
just off the almost-completed Royal Crescent,
– 1795
where he lives with his second wife until her
Smith dies in London at the house of his
death. He continues to teach until the age of 81.
stepdaughter, Emilia Coxe.
1799 –
Anecdotes of George Frederick Handel and
John Christopher Smith is published anonymously
by the Rev William Coxe (Smith was his
stepfather through his second marriage).
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 23
14/05/2015 16:45:38
 Marco Borggreve

24 earlymusictoday june–august 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com

EMTJJA15_024-027_F_Feature 1 Stile Antico.indd 24 14/05/2015 16:49:25

 Circular syncing
Philip Sommerich talks to STILE ANTICO as they mark a decade of professional success
with their distinctive performance style
W
hen most ensembles
celebrate significant
anniversaries, it is the
director who is bathed in
the media spotlight, explaining founding
principles and future directions. Not so
Stile Antico, which celebrates its tenth
anniversary: just in as the group’s
performances, at this birthday party there
is no conductor but 12 voices speaking
and singing in harmony.
Today Stile Antico is internationally
renowned and praised for the virtuosity
and intensity of its chamber-music-like
performances of Renaissance sacred
works. Yet it was born not out of a
charismatic conductor’s guiding vision,
but the almost accidental gelling of a
Cambridge student musical get-together
into something more lasting.
As soprano and founder member Kate
Ashby admits, even marking this as the
end of the ensemble’s first decade is a bit of
a cheat. ‘The tenth anniversary is of our
group as a professional ensemble; we
started in 2001 as a group of mainly first-
year students. But Emma [Ashby], who
sings alto, was actually doing her GCSEs at
the time, so some of us were still at school.
We just met up and enjoyed singing, so we
would put on concerts during the holidays.
We knew once we left university that we
wanted it to carry on doing it but we didn’t
know how far it would go or how
seriously we would do it.’
From the beginning, there was no
thought of having a conductor – this was
just a group of friends sharing thoughts
about repertoire they enjoyed singing.
The sound and visual spectacle that
provided soon became a hallmark. The
singers usually form a semi-circle, and
sometimes full circle, on stage so each
member is in eye contact with the others,
and that has created a distinctive
closeness among the 12.
For some, though, that togetherness was
already present. The aforementioned
Emma is Kate’s sister, as is fellow soprano
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_024-027_F_Feature 1 Stile Antico.indd 25
Helen – all founding members. ‘Helen and
I were both at Cambridge along with a
few other founder members. When we
were getting a group together we realised
we were short of an alto, so brought our
little sister along,’ Kate explains. ‘Judging
by questions after the concerts, I think a
large proportion of the audience
(especially in America) spend most of the
concert trying to work out who are the
three sisters.’
When the ensemble won the Friends of
York Early Music Festival prize in 2005,
they decided to go professional, hence the
anniversary. One of the jury members was
Robina Young, artistic director and
producer for Harmonia Mundi USA, and
From the beginning, there was no thought
of having a conductor – this was just
a group of friends sharing thoughts
about repertoire they enjoyed singing
she decided on the spot to record Stile
Antico. Nine albums and a host of awards
later, she has no cause to regret her
decision. ‘I found this happy-looking
bunch of singers who proceeded to sing
beautifully,’ Young recalls. ‘They weren’t
awarded the first prize but did get the
audience prize, so I just waited a little
while and approached them. It was such a
joy to see people with the eye contact they
have, acting like chamber music players.’
The intense personal communication
that Stile Antico’s format demands is
reflected in a consistency of membership.
More than ten years on, six of the original
12 are still in the group. Several members
are able to switch voice parts, and over the
years all have learned to mix and match.
‘That’s why it is so difficult to find a
replacement when someone leaves,’ Kate
says, ‘because the voices are so particular.’
As the decade has progressed, so have
the ensemble’s members, from students to
parents, actual and impending. ‘We have a
couple of babies due and four born in the
past 18 months. For the first few years it
seemed that the singing was being fitted
around careers, and now the new
challenge is families. It means things
change and we try to have rehearsals on
tours and people bring babies on tour.’
Tom Flint is the group’s most recent
recruit, having joined in April 2013. Since
coming to the UK from Australia in 2011,
he has sung in several early music groups
and as a lay clerk at Winchester Cathedral.
He was welcomed into the family only
seven months after his initial audition.
‘Every voice is important in the group,’
Kate explains, ‘but Tom is our low bass so
he is very fundamental – literally – so we
had to be sure he was right for it. He had
to be the right kind of voice and
personality, and to fit in socially as well.’
He rapidly identified the Stile Antico
difference. ‘Partly it comes down to
intensive rehearsal, so you get to know the
repertoire really well. We establish ideas
about tempi and phrasing, and once it gets
to the performance stage there’s a huge
reliance on listening across the group. On
stage, the performers group as mixed
voices rather than in parts to help every
member hear the vocal blend. You can
really clock into what people on either
side of you are doing. There is a lot of
visual communication as well. If, for
example, you have a paired entry with
somebody else you can read their body
language as well. It starts to feel like a
sixth sense.’ 
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 25
18/05/2015 09:59:56
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


 

 
 






HANDEL Xerxes

 25 and 26 July, Longborough Festival Opera

30 July, Britten Theatre, London

 2 August, St Mary in the Castle, Hastings


2015 season WAGNER

VERDI
12 June - 26 July 2015



www.lfo.org.uk 01451 830292

HANDEL HOUSE Supporting baroque Douglas Hollick

musicians at the start of
Organist and Harpsichordist
talent their professional careers
A musician of substantial worth
The West Australian

Masterly presentation of Baroque

music
Canstatter Zeitung Stuttgart

Played with flair and conviction

…. this was a jewel in the
University early music series
Nottingham Evening Post

A sheer delight
Buxtehude CD review,
Choir & Organ

Forthcoming concerts by Douglas Hollick:

Handel House Museum at 25 Brook Street, London was
home to the great baroque composer George Frideric
Handel. He lived here from 1723 until his death in 1759, and
composed some of the greatest music in history, including
Messiah, Zadok the Priest and Music for the Royal Fireworks.
The museum, through Handel House Talent, supports the
development of six musicians in a free, year-long programme
with a range of workshops, tutorials, masterclasses and
performances. Follow their journey at www.handelhouse.org
J S Bach Goldberg Variations for harpsichord:
March 1, 5.15pm Clare College Chapel, Cambridge
Details from 01400 230363
March 20, 7.30pm Sleaford Music Club
Details from 01529 304389
May 1, 7.30pm Chameleon presents J S Bach 330
Janet Forbes, recorders & soprano; Douglas Hollick, chamber organ
Harlaxton Summer Music, Harlaxton Manor near Grantham
Details from Red Cross Grantham office on 08450 547171
See http://www.classical-artists.com/douglas-hollick or contact:
Willoughby House, West Willoughby,
Grantham, Lincs, NG32 3SN. Tel/Fax 01400 230363.
email: dwh@globalnet.co.uk
 Every member of the group is able to –
and does – suggest repertoire, and there is
an online ‘wish list’ where works can be
stored. Programmes are grouped around
themes. ‘There is so much music in this
repertoire, and so much history and
theology that it’s nice to have a theme,’
Kate says. ‘The music was not written to
be performed as an hour-and-a-half
concert, so we try to give some coherence
to the programme.’ The emphasis is on
sacred works, Kate explains, because
secular works tend to be just one voice per
part. As Flint points out, most Renaissance
composers wrote for church and court, so
‘when I sing Monteverdi I think of his
secular music, and when you have a text
change to sacred you can still sing in a
madrigalian style’.
To mark the tenth anniversary,
Harmonia Mundi is releasing an album
for which each of the 12 members chose a
favourite track. Flint’s choice was Tallis’ ‘In
pace in idipsum’. ‘It is nice and low, good
for my voice, rich but sparse. It ticks all the
boxes for me.’ Kate opted for something
more obscure: ‘Hortus conclusus’ by
Ceballos. ‘It was in the very first concert
we gave, so it is very nostalgic, and it is on
our “Song of Songs” disc. It is only in four
parts but it still somehow creates quite a
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_024-027_F_Feature 1 Stile Antico.indd 27
rich harmony, and there is a real sultriness
about it.’
Already in the can is Stile Antico’s
Christmas album, titled ‘A Wondrous
Mystery!’, on which grouped around
sections of Clemens non Papa’s festive
‘Missa Pastores quidnam vidistis’ are
Flemish and German Christmas carols and
motets. An album of works by Giaches de
Wert is also in the planning stages. ‘The
more concerts we do, the more promoters
ask us for particular works,’ Kate explains.
‘A promoter in Antwerp asked us for an
entire concert of de Wert and so we found
some lovely pieces which we recorded.’
The ensemble has been posing the
question ‘Sacred or profane?’ as its concert
theme this season. The programme,
ranging from Dufay to Monteverdi,
illustrates how folk tunes, chansons and
racy madrigals were adapted for masses
and other sacred works. The group
averages about 40 concerts a year,
organised to fit with family commitments,
with the US now an annual pilgrimage.
Works by contemporary composers are
increasingly finding their way into Stile
Antico programmes, usually blended with
early works – such as a programme of
motets by William Byrd and James
MacMillan. The late John McCabe and
Huw Watkins have tackled commissions
to write for 12 unaccompanied voices that
produce a distinctive sound; a commission
from Nico Muhly, based on Shakespeare
texts about sleep, will be premiered at the
ensemble’s tenth-anniversary concert at
Wigmore Hall in November.
The singers’ enthusiasm for education
has been aided by the establishment of the
Stile Antico Foundation, which has
gathered enough funding for a series of
school visits and workshops. In June, the
first Young Singers’ Bursary enables two
students from the University of York to
pursue professional development and
work with the group.
Flint is now an integral part of the Stile
Antico family, after an ill-starred debut.
‘I was told that I had got the job on the day
that we were leaving for the States,’ he
recalls. By the time they arrived in the US,
he had a raging chest infection and lost his
voice halfway through the first concert. ‘We
were very lucky on that tour we happened
to bring four basses.’ Cold-weather ills dog
all vocalists, but the ensemble’s on-tour
crises have included cases of sunburn,
sports injury and tummy bugs (on the
occasion of their first foreign trip, to France,
a vomiting bug wiped out 80% of the
team). Just like any family’s history, in fact.
Eric Richmond
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 27
14/05/2015 16:50:15
 Keeping the faith
Andrew Stewart speaks to PETER SEYMOUR about how a belief in the talent of the
composer and in the true meaning of the work itself has seen his group, Yorkshire Bach
Soloists, record one of early music’s most performed works: Bach’s St Matthew Passion
I
n an age in which heavily hyped
brands have gained pseudo-religious
power over consumers and
marketing attention spans are
measured in milliseconds, it’s refreshing to
discover anything rooted in deeper spiritual
values. Peter Seymour and his Yorkshire
Baroque Soloists (YBS), hardly household
names, stand as torchbearers for music-
making with full attention. Their latest
recording, a revelatory account of the early
version of Bach’s St Matthew Passion, holds
the ear with its compelling engagement
with the human drama of Christ’s betrayal,
trial and crucifixion. It also strikes the heart
with profound reflections on the Passion
story’s essential message of unconditional
love and sacrifice. There’s another message
in the recording’s mix, a complex one that
speaks of the integrity of Seymour’s
scholarship, his devotion to working over
many years with the same performers, the
generosity of a private donor long inspired
by YBS, and the wholehearted involvement
of one of Britain’s brightest independent
classical labels.
YBS came to life in 1973, founded by
Peter Seymour during his student years at
Peter Seymour has led the
Yorkshire Bach Soloists for
over four decades
Jim Poyner PHOTOGRAPHY
28 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_028-029_F_Feature 2 Paul McCresh.indd 28
the University of York. Seymour’s
subsequent doctoral dissertation on
aspects of historical performance practice
arose from his work as a harpsichordist
and period keyboard player. Today he
balances concert commitments with a
professorial post at the University of York;
his period instrument ensemble,
meanwhile, remains dedicated to the
performance of 17th- and 18th-century
repertoire.
Its credits over the years include a
recorded recreation of festal high mass at
the imperial Viennese court as it might
have sounded in 1648; the early advocacy
of Duncan Druce’s completion of the
Mozart Requiem; regular work with the
Yorkshire Bach Choir and at the York
Early Music Festival; and an impressive
portfolio of national and international
concert dates.
The ensemble’s recent run of Bach
recordings for Signum Classics confirms
that four decades of hard work have not
been in vain. The series, underpinned by
generous sponsorship from YBS supporter
Celia Burgan, was launched in 2010 with
the St John Passion and enhanced soon
after with the release of a critically
acclaimed reading of the Mass in B minor.
Seymour hesitated before accepting
Burgan’s offer to sponsor a recording of
the St Matthew Passion. ‘I was uncertain
about making yet another version,’ he
recalls. ‘But several of our players and
singers who have performed it with YBS
on many occasions encouraged me to go
with it.’
It was oboist Anthony Robson’s zeal for
the work’s original score that finally
persuaded Seymour to press the project
start button. ‘Tony conducted the 1727
version for the London Bach Society about
six months before we made our recording.
He enthused to me about some of the
differences from the familiar 1736 score,
such as the lute in “Komm, süßes Kreuz”
and the first bass replacing the alto solo at
the opening of Part Two. I was convinced
by his belief in the early version.’
Robson also pointed to debatable
editorial decisions in Bärenreiter’s 2004
publication for the Neue Bach Ausgabe
and problems with its performing
material. Seymour decided to prepare his
own edition. He spent two months in the
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 16:54:00

summer of 2013 with a facsimile of the
full score, as copied in the 1740s by one of
Bach’s students (most likely his son-in-
law Johann Christoph Altnikol) and
carefully fashioned a convincing
performing edition.
‘I enjoy editing music for performance
and it proved to be an enormously
satisfying and rewarding time. But we
weren’t trying to create a museum piece
with this project. We’ve been performing
There is so much in the text and even built into
the fabric of the work itself that reveals Bach’s
private faith and personal devotion
Bach’s Passions, his other large-scale
vocal works, and many of his cantatas for
decades now, and always aim to bring
these pieces to life. Over the years, we’ve
developed a style of our own and have
always made our own decisions about
details of performance.’
Like Bach in Leipzig, Seymour
employed a team of four concertato
singers as soloists and to perform the
music for Choir I; a second group of four
ripienists took care of Choir II and covered
minor solo parts such as Pilate’s wife,
Judas and the false witnesses.
A prior engagement meant that
Seymour’s sage choice of Evangelist,
Charles Daniels, was unavailable to
record the work’s choruses. ‘Because
Charles couldn’t make the final sessions,
we ended up with nine singers for the
recording; otherwise, we performed the
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_028-029_F_Feature 2 Paul McCresh.indd 29
St Matthew Passion with the forces that
Bach used.’ While the early version’s
orchestration, he continues, closely
matches that of the 1736 version, its
continuo parts are distributed between
both orchestras, and recorders give way to
flutes in the tenor arioso ‘O Schmerz’.
‘I’ve used a substantial continuo team
for some time in Bach, ever since reading
Laurence Dreyfus’ excellent book Bach’s
Continuo Group. He cites persuasive
evidence that, as early as the 1724
performance of the St John Passion, Bach
expected a team comprising cello, violone,
bassoon, organ and harpsichord. We don’t
know whether he used them all the time,
but he definitely had them to hand and
provided music for them, so my guess is
that he did use them. Their combination
produces a very special palette of tone
colours, and the harpsichord is the ideal
instrument from which to direct the
recitatives and arias.’ The recording’s
multihued soundworld is also conditioned
by the use of single strings, an approach
backed by current Bach scholarship.
Beyond the substantive differences
between the 1727 and 1736 versions of
Bach’s great Passion, Seymour’s edition of
the former contains myriad details
inspired by performance conventions of
the period. The facsimile score, he notes,
It was the encouragement of YBS performers
that convinced Seymour to record the early
version of the St Matthew Passion
includes indications for ‘false’
ornamentation in recitatives, signifying
the addition of an appoggiatura to single-
syllable or masculine phrase endings. The
final syllable of Peter’s denial ‘Ich kenne
des Menschen nicht’, for example, is
voiced on an appoggiatura in both the
St John and St Matthew Passions.
‘I believe the convention Bach followed
was not to expect such an appoggiatura
on a single-syllable ending,’ Seymour
observes. ‘This is why he indicates one
here: to show that Peter was making a
false statement. If Bach’s performers
habitually added an appoggiatura then
there was no need for him to indicate
one; it’s there as an exception and for a
special reason. There are other essential
ornaments, such as cadential trills, which
his performers would have done as a
matter of course.’
Seymour’s interpretation flows, above
all, from its vital connection with the
words of the Gospel story and of
Picander’s poetic meditations on the
crucifixion. ‘There is so much in the text
and even built into the fabric of the work
itself that reveals Bach’s private faith and
personal devotion,’ he comments. ‘To me
there is no doubt that he wanted to
communicate the centrality of Christ’s
death and its profound meaning to his
listeners. And that
is also at the
centre of my faith.’
‘St Matthew Passion
BWV 244b (Early
Version)’ is reviewed
on page 42.
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 29
14/05/2015 16:56:07
 The sound in silence
Don Greig of the Orlando Consort speaks to EMT about creating a soundtrack for
the classic silent movie La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc
W
e pride ourselves in the critics as ‘silent cinema at its most
Orlando Consort on sublimely expressive’. There’s no denying
making very reasonable its power and, having viewed it probably
demands of concert some 50 times or more when designing
promoters. ‘Just give us some music the soundtrack, it still has the power to
stands, a few chairs at the back of the amaze and move me.
stage, some water and we’ll be fine,’ we But why has a group that specialises in
say. And on tour the most technically medieval music chosen to take on the
challenging instrument we have to explain film’s soundtrack? The concept is far from
to airport security staff is a tuning fork. arbitrary; the soundtrack is collated
All that has changed recently: now we entirely from music from the period in
have to transport a laptop and an extra which the film is set. Joan was born in
screen, earbuds and remote controls, 1412 and was executed in 1431 and
and when we arrive at a venue the first though, with a very few exceptions, one
thing that needs to be inspected is the can never be entirely certain when pieces
projector and screen. were composed, I’m fairly confident that
This is certainly not the soundtrack that
Dreyer would have heard
The reason for such a departure is that somewhere during that period all of the
we have moved into the world of music could have been heard somewhere.
multimedia – a rather grand term for what Further support is provided by Dreyer
is essentially an early 20th-century himself, who objected to a new soundtrack
artform, namely live soundtrack for a of music by Scarlatti, J. S. Bach and other
silent movie. The film in question is baroque composers made in the 1950s on
Carl Theodor Dreyer’s 1928 masterpiece, the grounds that it was anachronistic.
La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc. It came ninth The film gives itself very well to the
in Sight & Sound’s Greatest Films of All repertoire. The screenplay condenses the
Time poll in 2012, and was described by six-month trial into a single day so that
30 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015
EMTJJA15_030-031_F_Feature 3 Orlando.indd 30
much of the action is Joan’s interrogation
in a very ecclesiastical setting. Her own
Christian faith – and Dreyer’s parallel of
her suffering with that of Christ – mean
that sacred music adds an appropriate
resonance, whatever the hypocrisy of the
examining clerics. And Joan, of course,
was inspired and guided by voices,
specifically those of St Michael,
St Catherine and St Margaret.
There’s a surprisingly large repertoire
from which to choose, given that the
French, Burgundian and English courts all
played their part. Although the Dauphin
was too poor to be able to maintain a
chapel choir, the Regent of France was the
Duke of Bedford, patron to, among others,
John Dunstable. And Burgundy, Joan’s
captors and the other sworn enemy of
France, boasted one of the richest musical
establishments of the period. Stylistically
the music offers further variety. A major
shift was underway at that time from an
austere, bitter and angular 14th-century
idiom towards the more consonant and
syllabic style of the 15th century,
influenced by the more suave English
approach known as the contenance angloise.
Many of the French composers worked in
Italy at the time which lends their music a
flair and flamboyance that proved apt for
the portrayal of some of the more violent
scenes of the film, whereas the sweeter,
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 18:29:52
 later idiom proved an effective empathic
contrast underscoring of the heroine’s
suffering. Similarly plainchant offers an
obvious amplification of some of the
liturgical scenes (the inquisitorial priests
offer her Eucharist in exchange for a
confession of heresy) and an illustration of
Joan’s guiding saints.
This is certainly not the soundtrack that
Dreyer would have heard. Aside from the
fact that the performance of this repertoire
in the modern day was pretty much
confined to universities, the film’s two
premieres in 1928 (one in Copenhagen
and one in Paris) received different but
equally traditional accompaniments. For
Paris there was a specially composed
score, whereas in Copenhagen it was
more a case of assembly by the local
theatre conductor. Essentially this was a
montage of tried-and-tested music cues,
cut and pasted from popular classics – a
standard form of musical accompaniment
to silent movies.
We follow this latter approach, carefully
crafting and timing appropriate cues, our
strict timings dictated from a synced
digital display that offers us both what is
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EMTJJA15_030-031_F_Feature 3 Orlando.indd 31
happening on the screen, and flashing
bar-numbers and beats. Normally that
would be the role of the conductor, but
that would be a foreign presence amid
such a small group of singers.
It’s been a feature of the Orlando
Consort’s continuing investigation into
medieval music to discover new ways of
presenting the repertoire to audiences
who might otherwise not be interested. To
that end we’ve worked with jazz
musicians, British-Asian performers,
children and adult choirs, and often
incorporated contemporary music into our
concerts to encourage audiences to engage
with music that they might not otherwise
hear. Selling a programme of less-familiar
figures like Libert, Loqueville, Benoit, Le
Grant, Grossin and Billart is something
that’s beyond even the most purist
presenter, so there’s a further satisfaction
beyond that of delivering an interesting
evening’s entertainment and introducing
people to one of the great movies; we’re
presenting a programme of music that
would otherwise never see the light of day
… which is ironic given that we have to
lower the lights.
The Orlando Consort’s performances of
‘Voices Appeared: La Passion de Jeanne
d’Arc’ will take place throughout 2015 at
York Early Music Festival (7 July),
Cheltenham Music Festival (8 July),
Lake District Summer Festival (7 August),
Kent University (25 October), Brighton Early
Music Festival (30 October), Turner Sims
Concert Hall in Southampton (1 November),
University of Nottingham (4 November),
Royal Northern College of Music
(24 November), Keele University
(25 November), Wiltshire Music Centre
(28 November); www.orlandoconsort.com.
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 2 – 11 July

ENTENTE CORDIALE

The 2015 Festival takes us on a journey across 300 years of music-making,

bringing together the music and musicians of England and France.
London Handel Players Andreas Staier Kati Debretzeni Mahan Esfahani Taverner Consort
Early Opera Company York Early Music International Young Artists Competition Huelgas Ensemble
Rose Consort of Viols The Orlando Consort The Sixteen The Clerks Yorkshire Baroque Soloists

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T Box Office 01904 658338
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 Rewriting history
JOGLARESA are marking the anniversary of the signing of the Magna Carta in their usual
musical rule-breaking manner, as Kim Burton finds out
T
he pay-and-display machine at
Runnymede’s National Trust tea
room car park is out of order, so
before I can sit down with
Joglaresa director Belinda Sykes to discuss
the band’s new programme quizzically
celebrating 800 years of the Magna Carta,
one of the staff has to scribble a quick note
to put on the car. It’s not quite the
founding document of modern democracy,
but somehow this encounter of the historic
site with the discontents of our modern
world, solved by a judicious mix of
improvisation and accommodation, chimes
with Sykes’ belief in medieval song and its
relevance to the present.
As she points out, the history of the
Magna Carta is not without its problems or
its ironies. Not so much a resounding
statement of liberties and the harbinger of
the modern democratic state, as a
desperate and doomed attempt to stave off
civil war. Within three months of its
signing it had been annulled by Pope
Joglaresa’s ‘Robbers,
Rebels and Royals’
tours the UK this year
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_033_F_Feature 4 Joglaresa.indd 33
Innocent III at King John’s request, London
was occupied by French forces, and its
rumoured prime-mover Archbishop
Langton of Canterbury was facing
excommunication. Somehow, though, it
survived, and although most of its clauses
(including the regulation of fish weirs and,
more disturbingly, the expulsion of
refugees) fell by the wayside, two vital
principles are still with us: habeas corpus, or
protection against arbitrary imprisonment,
and equality before the law.
‘Robbers, Rebels and Royals’, which
Joglaresa will be presenting throughout
2015 to mark the anniversary, uses their
trademark interweaving of song, musical
improvisation, storytelling and political
awareness to illuminate such ironies. The
familiar English lament ‘Ar ne kuth ich
sorge non’ is set in the context of Bad King
John’s habit of holding his subjects for
ransom. Alongside it, the first modern
performances of 13th-century songs
protesting against the squandering of tax
Runnymede,
the site of the
sealing of the
Magna Carta
revenue on foreign wars cast a sardonic
sidelight on today’s political discourse,
while more cheerfully, motets based on the
tales of Robin and Marion celebrate the
persistence of folk memory.
Sykes admits that Joglaresa might not
strictly respect the ‘authority’ of the
written note, but as she says, ‘a slavish
reproduction of what lies on the page
strikes me as inauthentic’. Nonetheless, we
spend a considerable stretch of the
interview unpicking specific questions
about the provenance, chain of
transmission and linguistic features of
song texts. The entire project is informed
by this mixture of scholarly research,
musical adventurousness and serious
intent. She points to the message encoded
in a song from the 14th century Roman de
Fauvel, an excoriating attack on corruption
set to a melody originally composed for
the coronation of Richard I.
‘Once I started looking at the medieval
song texts, it surprised me how easy it was
to translate that into modern reactions
about the bargain we make with the state
to govern us well. Look at Floret fex
Favellea: “Today every poor person is the
object of contempt”. That’s exactly what
governments are dong to us today in their
divisive, blame-the-benefit-cheats politics,
don’t look at us or what we’re doing.
Whereas poverty is the thing we should
have a go at. I find it remarkable that it
was seen so clearly back then. The song
says “Though created in the image of
Christ, man is condemned”; it’s a way of
saying that we’re all created equal.’
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 33
18/05/2015 10:06:30
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 Bringing back bestsellers
Andrew Green talks to the team behind the Big Ballads Project about their revival
of 17th-century ‘pop’ music
T
o the members of the Carnival
Band (pictured above) it’s the
‘Big Ballads Project’; to the Arts
and Humanities Research
Council which stumped up the cash, it’s
the more prosaic ‘Hit songs and their
significance in seventeenth-
century England’, the title attached to the
funding application devised by the project’s
instigator, professor Chris Marsh of
Queen’s University Belfast.
Marsh’s idea has involved targeting a
hundred 17th-century ‘hit’ songs for the
Carnival Band to record to enhance public
knowledge and academic understanding of
so-called ‘broadside ballads’. Marsh says: ‘I
felt that existing recordings were too pure
and too refined for what was often a genre
of England’s streets and alehouses. I love
the energy of the band’s playing and felt
instinctively that they and assorted singing
guests would bring the ballads to life.’
‘A broadside ballad,’ the band’s founder
Andy Watts explains, ‘was a song, printed
on one side of paper, sold for a penny.
Typically, it featured a text of 12 or more
verses, several simple woodcut illustrations,
and the name of a suggested melody. The
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_035_F_Feature 5 Carnival.indd 35
pictures and tunes were frequently well-
known already. Many of the melodies
come from the English virginalists, such as
Byrd, Gibbons, Bull and Tomkins, or from
lutenists like Dowland, or from the dance
music of Playford. But there are also theatre
songs from the time of Lawes and Purcell.
‘Ballads were the pop songs of their day
and it can be convincingly argued that the
modern music industry – commercially
driven and predominantly urban – has its
roots here. In terms of the subject matter,
love led the way, but there’s also religion,
politics, heroic adventures and terrible
crimes. It’s fun to see how the stories
unfold gradually – the “Blind Beggar of
Bethnal Green” who turns out to be an
exiled Duke; or the young woman who’s
seduced by a soldier, but then gets the
better of the Excise-Man.’
‘Few sources provide such rich evidence
of cultural tastes and interests in the
period,’ adds Marsh, who is collaborating
in the project with Dr Angela McShane of
the Victoria and Albert Museum. ‘Ballads
were around at a time of comparatively
low literacy, so the pictures they carried
and the familiar tunes to which the words
were sung meant they were accessible to
those who couldn’t read.’
There was no one way of delivering a
ballad, so the new recordings feature
singers from the folk and early music
worlds, including Vivien Ellis, Ian Giles,
Maddy Prior, Nancy Kerr, Lucie Skeaping
and Benny Graham. (The odd number is
performed by one of the Carnival Band,
giving an idea of how ‘ordinary people’
might have sung the ballads.) A single
instrument, such as a fiddle or cittern,
provides accompaniment where required,
although spoons, bones, pots and pans also
have their moments in the limelight.
The Big Ballads Project embraces concerts
(already under way, with a launch event
having taken place at the National Centre
for Early Music in February) and will also
give rise to a book and website. One
intriguing offshoot has been a collaboration
between the Carnival Band and Folkestra,
a group of young folk musicians from
Newcastle. For Andy Watts and his
indefatigable crew, it’s all just a little bit
different. ‘I’ve been in the music business
35 years,’ he says, ‘and this has to be one of
the most rewarding things I’ve ever done.’
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 35
14/05/2015 16:59:32
 REVIEWS
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Flights of Angels: Francisco Guerrero/ The Sixteen’s rewarding and often unfamiliar programme
Alonso Lobo begins with Guerrero’s luminous 12-voice setting of the ‘Duo
The Sixteen, Harry Christophers (d) Seraphim’ text. This piece, his tenderly expressive ‘Maria
Coro COR 16128 Magdalene’ motet and the two Agnus Dei from his ‘Missa
 Congratulamini mihi’ are among the most glorious sounding
in an uninterrupted sequence of music which deserves to be
better known. As so often Christophers and the Sixteen
Francisco Guerrero and Alonso Lobo, master and student prove to be the most persuasive advocates imaginable.
provide the music sung here by the Sixteen under the Polyphonic textures are well nourished, unfailingly
direction of its founder, Harry Christophers. Guerrero was transparent and with extended phrases shaped confidently
one of Spain’s leading 16th-century composers. He travelled and eloquently. A commendably helpful essay by Martyn
widely, mainly to Italy but also to the Holy Land about which Imrie sets the seal on an outstanding release, beautifully
he later wrote in a popular account ‘El Viaje de Hierusalem’. recorded and scintillatingly sung. Vivant Sedecim! NA
Most of his life was spent in Seville where he served
eventually as maestro de capilla at the cathedral. Lobo assisted
him there, as well as learning from him before being WIN A COPY!
appointed maestro de capilla of Toledo Cathedral. Five years EARLY MUSIC TODAY has five copies of ‘Flights of Angels’ to give away. To win
a copy, send a postcard to ‘Disc of the Month – June 15’, Early Music Today,
after Guerrero’s death in 1599 Lobo returned to Seville
assuming the title and duties of his mentor.
Rhinegold Publishing, 20 Rugby Street, London WC1N 3QZ.

CDs
Delalande: Symphonies music is full of character and charm whose instrumentation here is
pour les Soupers du Roy and nowhere more so than in three confined to woodwind and strings.
Elbipolis Barockorchester ‘Caprices ou Fantaisies’ all of which Among them are two extended
Hamburg, Jürgen Gross (d) feature in this pleasingly presented Passacailles and a fine Sarabande en
Challenge Classics programme. Rondeau. The musical high watermark,
CC72664 The Elbipolis Baroque Orchestra though is the second Caprice in G
 Hamburg has confined itself primarily minor ‘que le Roy demandoit souvent’.
to German repertoire, until now. Here Here we find passages of sustained,
Lalande, de Lalande, Delalande, take the musicians present their French and tender beauty, sometimes with a
your pick (the last-mentioned is credentials with aplomb if not hint of melancholy. NA
preferred on this disc), was a favoured invariably with ultramontine
composer of Louis XIV. By the time of inflexions. The music has been Vivaldi: Concerti a
his death in 1726 he had occupied all preserved in ‘short score’, in this quattro, Sonata a tre
the principal musical posts at court instance mostly upper part and bass I Fiori Musicali, Maria
and had composed over 60 ‘grands from which the composer’s fuller Giovanna Fiorentino
motets’, numerous sacred pieces for intentions can be realised. Frequent (recorder, flute)
smaller ensembles and almost 20 references to particular Tactus TC 672255
ballets. The main corpus of his instrumentation allow us to form a 
instrumental music is contained in a clear picture of Delalande’s colourful
vast collection of ‘Simphonies pour les and rich-textured palette. Timbre, originally a French word for
Soupers du Roy’ assembled over Violinist and director Jürgen Gross bell, did not acquire any musical
different periods into dance suites. The has selected dances from three suites connotations until the mid-18th

36 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com

EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 36 14/05/2015 18:30:27


century, although it’s clear earlier
composers, such as Bach and Vivaldi,
were expert at using instrumental
colours in all kinds of ways. Vivaldi
composed more than 20 chamber
concertos – works for three to six solo
instruments with continuo – many of
which employ striking timbral
contrasts. On this CD, the focus is on
the juxtaposition of high and low
winds, so four of its five concertos
feature recorder or flute and bassoon,
with violin a middle voice; the sole trio
sonata, RV86, is for recorder and
bassoon alone.
Given such intriguing repertoire, it’s
galling that I Fiori Musicali do it scant
justice. The group is not helped by a
murky acoustic or a recording balance
that seems at times to push all the
instruments into a background
clamour. But the playing too lacks
polish: the group can sound like a
muddle in a hurry, and their shaping
of phrases, of dynamics, shows little
finesse. Fortunately, Il Giardino
Armonico include three of these
concertos (RV91, RV100, RV103), as
well as RV86, on their splendid
Concerti da Camera series for Das Alte
Werk. Their versions demonstrate all
the flair, poise and acoustic clarity that
I Fiori Musicali fail to muster. GL
Handel: Joshua,
HWV 64
NDR Chor,
FestspielOrchester
Göttingen, Laurence
Cummings (d)
Accent ACC 26403 (2 CDs)

Handel gave the first performance of
his oratorio ‘Joshua’ at London’s
Theatre Royal, Covent Garden in 1748.
The text, which may be by Thomas
Morell, concerns the conquest of the
Promised Land by the Israelites and is
a metaphor for the victory of the
Hanoverian dynasty over the Catholic
pretender to the throne, Charles Stuart.
The present live recording with
applause at the conclusion of Acts 1
and 3, was made at the 2014 Göttingen
International Handel Festival and
features an international cast of solo
vocalists, the North German Radio
Choir and the Göttingen Festival
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EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 37
Orchestra of period instruments.
Laurence Cummings, the festival’s
director and the musical director of
this performance is a persuasive
Handelian with a lively stylistic sense
to which the excellent instrumentalists
respond with warmth and immediacy.
The solo lineup, alas, is a very mixed
bag. Anna Dennis (Achsah, daughter
of Caleb) comfortably steals the show
with her alluring vocal timbre, fluent
technique and secure intonation. To
her role is assigned the best-known air
of the piece, ‘O, had I Jubal’s lyre’.
Renata Pokupić’s Israelite warrior,
Othniel who will marry Achsah is less
engaging. Her intonation is variable
and her vibrato excessive. Tobias
Berndt (Caleb) and Joachim Duske
(Angel) are disappointing, too.
Kenneth Tarver in the title role has an
athletic technique, capable of virtuosity
when required. His intonation though
is occasionally insecure, especially in
the uppermost notes of his range. The
choruses, one of which is the second
well-known number, ‘See, the
conqu’ring hero comes!’ are well sung
and crisply articulated. NA
Fasch: Quartets and
Concertos
Ensemble Marsyas, Peter
Whelan (bassoon), Pamela
Thorby (recorder)
Linn CKD 467

Born in 1688, Fasch spent his formative
musical years in Leipzig, where he
became friends with Stölzel, Pisendel,
Heinichen and Graupner – the latter
pair, like Fasch, studied at the
Thomasschule under Bach’s
predecessor, Kuhnau. In the 1720s
Fasch tried to establish a music
exchange network, allowing composers
to circulate scores, which may explain
why much of his surviving music is
located at Dresden and Darmstadt,
where his friends worked, rather than
at Anhalt-Zerbst, where he was
Kapellmeister from 1722 until his
death in 1758.
Although a violinist himself, Fasch
wrote extensively for woodwinds,
particularly the bassoon, possibly
inspired by the Vivaldi concertos he
heard in Prague when working for
Reviews: cds
Count Morzin, an avid collector of the
Red Priest’s scores. This new Ensemble
Marsyas CD features a quirky bassoon
concerto, plus four finely crafted
quartets for bassoon, two oboes and
continuo. There is also a quartet apiece
for horn and recorder (each with oboe,
violin and continuo), and a dashing
recorder concerto recently discovered
in the New York Public Library, where
it had been misfiled under ‘Rasch’!
Bassoonist Peter Whelan is
outstanding, although the whole group
plays with uncanny rapport, turning
Fasch’s smart blends of instrumental
timbres, baroque and galant styles,
elegant Largos and frisky, virtuosic
Allegros, into a stream of unalloyed
listening pleasure. GL
Leclair: Sonatas for 2
violins, op.12
Harmonie Universelle,
Florian Deuter, Mónica
Waisman (vln)
Accent ACC 24298

Leclair: The Complete
Sonatas for Two Violins
Greg Ewer, Adam
LaMotte (vln)
Sono Luminus DSL-92176

‘It’s a genuine disgrace that members
of the baroque fraternity adopt any
number of trifling figures with whoops
of excitement, while the output of this
great violinist still remains to be
rediscovered time and again.’ Nearly a
decade has elapsed since Reinhard
Goebel lamented our neglect of Leclair
in his CD-notes for Harmonie
Universelle’s 2006 recording of the op.3
sonatas for two violins, yet even last
year’s 250th anniversary of Leclair’s
death – a brutal, unsolved murder –
failed to spark a major revival of
interest, though it presumably played
a part in the release of these CDs.
Leclair was not only one of the 18th
century’s greatest violinists – he
reportedly ‘played like an angel’ – he
was also an innovative composer.
According to one writer, his many
sonatas and concertos ‘virtually
created the French school of violin
playing’; while his music also realised
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 37
18/05/2015 12:25:12
 Reviews: cds
François Couperin’s ideal of the
réunion des goûts, its seamless
integration of Italian virtuosity and
French elegance no doubt helped by
the six years Leclair spent in Turin.
His two sets of sonatas for two
unaccompanied violins, op.3 and
op.12, were published in 1730 and
1747 respectively. The earlier set,
easier to play and simpler in structure,
probably had a pedagogical purpose,
yet makes attractive listening; the later
sonatas, ‘notably more complicated
and freer,’ says Goebel, can sound
utterly entrancing.
Such is the case in the hands of
Florian Deuter and Mónica Waisman,
aka Harmonie Universelle, whose new
disc of the op.12 sonatas reaffirms the
genial mastery shown on their earlier
recording of the op.3 set for
Eloquentia. Veterans of the European
early music circuit, they sound
absolutely at ease with Leclair’s music,
dancing nimbly through the quicker
movements, teasing out the slower
with a beguiling tenderness, as in the
fourth sonata’s haunting Largo.
The American duo of Greg Ewer and
Adam LaMotte, both members of the
Portland Baroque Orchestra, are
accomplished performers, yet their
interpretations lack the sense of
familiarity with Leclair’s language, the
subtleties of execution, that
characterise Harmonie Universelle’s
versions. Their playing can seem
linear, where Deuter and Waisman
cavort and flow, or be a touch hard-
edged and overemphatic, where
Deuter and Waisman are relaxed, even
playful. The latter pair convey a real
sense of enjoyment, making light of the
formidable technical challenges as they
explore the many pleasures to be
found in Leclair’s lovely, endlessly
inventive music. GL
Rameau: Les Fêtes de
Polymnie
Purcell Choir, Orfeo
Orchestra, György
Vashegyi (d)
Glossa GCD 923502

Les Fétes de Polymnie, first performed in
Paris in October 1745, marked
Rameau’s initial collaboration with the
38 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 38
poet Louis de Cahusac, who would
provide librettos for several of his later
works, including Les Fétes de l’Hymen et
de l’Amour and Zoroastre. The adulatory
Prologue acclaims Louis XV’s victory
at the Battle of Fontenoy in May 1745,
although the subsequent three entrées,
each depicting the union of a loving
couple, suggest this ballet héroïque
might initially have been intended to
celebrate the Dauphin’s wedding to
the Spanish Infanta the previous
February. The mood is festive
throughout, helped by numerous
ballets, choruses and spectacular
tableaux, from the raising of a gold
statue of Louis XV in the Prologue to
the ‘vile frenzy’ of a raucous hunting
party in the final entrée. Rameau
orchestrates it all with characteristic
élan: his use of winds and brass in
particular shows marvellous
imagination, and the music is, by
turns, delicate and sumptuous,
exhilarating and seductive.
The team of first-class soloists here
includes sopranos Véronique Gens,
Emöke Baráth and Aurélia Legay,
baritone Thomas Dolié and the ardent
haute-contre Mathias Vidal. The Orfeo
Orchestra and Purcell Choir are based
in Budapest (though the familiar name
of Simon Standage appears as
concertmaster), yet they sound
completely au fait with the etiquettes of
French baroque music. Magnifique! GL
Bach: Köthener
Trauermusik,
BWV 244a
Ensemble Pygmalion,
Raphaël Pichon (d)
Harmonia Mundi
HMC 902211

The funeral obsequies of Bach’s Cöthen
employer Prince Leopold took place in
March 1729. For them Bach apparently
provided ‘mourning music’ for the
evening of the cortege’s arrival and a
large-scale cantata in four parts for the
funeral service itself. The music for
both is now lost. It has long been
conjectured (though not entirely
without controversy) that the music for
the cantata was largely drawn from the
St Matthew Passion and the Trauer-Ode,
BWV198. That leaves the setting of the
‘dictum’ (Old Testament text) that
frames Part Two, the reconstruction of
which here takes a fresh path in
employing the music of the opening
Kyrie of the B-minor Mass.
Incidentally, Raphaël Pichon’s
description of the ‘dictum’ as
‘enigmatic’ is curious; it would surely
have formed the text of the sermon?
This is not the first reconstruction of
the work on CD; Andrew Parrott
produced a disc in 2011 that
predictably follows his now well-
established principle of one-per-part
performance practice. Pichon uses a
responsive, youthful-sounding chorus
of 21, which along with some excellent
orchestral playing is the best feature of
a performance that has its moments -
one of the best is alto Damien Guillon’s
exquisitely lovely ‘Erhalte mich’ (a
parody of ‘Erbarme dich’) – but overall
for me lacks particular distinction or
gravitas. I suspect the Parrott (Avie) is
the one to go for. BR
Steffani: Niobe, Regina
di Tebe
Karina Gauvin (sop),
Philippe Jaroussky (c-t),
Boston Early Music
Festival Orchestra, Paul
O’Dette and Stephen
Stubbs (d)
Erato 0825646343546

Steffani: Niobe, Regina
di Tebe
Véronique Gens (sop),
Jacek Laszczkowski (male
sop), Balthasar-Neumann-
Ensemble, Thomas
Hengelbrock (d)
Opus Arte OA CD9008 D

You wait 300 years for a recording of
Niobe, Regina di Tebe and then two
come along at once! Steffani’s opera,
premiered at Munich in 1688, is a
fabulous cornucopia of baroque
entertainment, brimming with sexual
chicanery, political revenge,
spectacular effects and enchanting
music. The libretto by Luigi Orlandi,
based on a story in Ovid’s
Metamorphoses, calls for magical and
supernatural elements, including
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 16:28:49
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7267_LR_CKD 451 Early Music Today Ad_FINAL.indd 1 14/05/2015 09:51

Untitled-1 1 23/11/2011 09:13:23
Untitled-1 1 15/05/2013 09:35:09
 Reviews: cds
monsters, an ‘immense ghost’ whose
mouth is an abyss, city walls elevated
by song and a climactic earthquake,
during which ‘spiteful gods’ hurl
down thunderbolts to kill Niobe’s
children. Astonishingly, the real coups
de théâtre follow this murderous
mayhem: first, Anfione, Niobe’s
husband, stabs himself and the music
evokes his blood seeping away as he
expires, leaving his last aria
incomplete; then Niobe too breaks
down in her last aria as, numbed by
grief, she feels herself turning to stone.
Steffani is seen as a precursor to
Handel and his music for Niobe
certainly has the tuneful arias and rich
scoring we associate with Handelian
opera. In one remarkable scene,
Anfione invokes the harmony of the
spheres, accompanied by ‘viole’ and
‘bassi’ onstage, recorders and other
strings in the pit; their alternating,
contrary motions suggest the rotation
of the planets in a music of unearthly
beauty.
These two recordings both feature
fine teams of performers, although
there are crucial differences. Jacek
Laszczkowski’s soprano is an
extraordinary voice, and his tone of
ethereal hauteur may be an acquired
taste; I found him a less expressive
Anfione than countertenor Philippe
Jaroussky, who is especially poignant in
the suicide scene, where Laszczkowski’s
melismatic death throes sound rather
like a cooing pigeon. Véronique Gens is
a moving Niobe, her dark, burnished
soprano full of character; however,
Karina Gauvin sings strongly—and in a
clearer acoustic. The O’Dette-Stubbs set
is a studio recording, with immaculate
sound quality, whereas the Hengelbrock
is a live recording (from Covent Garden
in 2010) and comes with onstage noises
and a volume level that fluctuates as
the singers move around. As a result, it
can’t match the degrees of detail and
subtlety that mark the Erato studio
performance. The Opus Arte set is also
60 minutes shorter (the libretto has
been drastically cut), yet it’s almost
twice as expensive (full-price as
opposed to mid-price). So the O’Dette-
Stubbs version is my clear
recommendation; it’s a magnificent
account of Steffani’s enthralling, long-
neglected opera. GL
40 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 40
Handel: Jephtha
The Sixteen,
Harry Christophers (d)
Coro COR 16121

I imagine few would deny Handel’s
final oratorio its place as one of his
most moving and powerfully dramatic
works. It is this dramatic intensity
coupled with probing insight into the
humanity of the work that lies at the
heart of Harry Christophers’
inspirational direction. In particular, the
central drama – Jephtha’s recognition
that the sacrifice he has vowed to make
will be his own daughter Iphis – here
takes on an almost unbearable
poignancy hardly softened by the fate
of Iphis being contrived by Handel’s
librettist to become service to God,
rather than death.
Beyond Christophers the hero of this
performance is the choir, which brings
vivid immediacy to the magnificent
choruses, singing with excellent
diction and cleanly focussed tone.
James Gilchrist’s strongly projected
Jephtha develops credibly from
authoritative hero to broken father,
while Sophie Bevan’s Iphis is also
splendidly characterised, conveying a
chaste innocent charm that evolves
convincingly to patient acceptance of
her fate. Susan Bickley’s Storgè, Robin
Blaze’s Hamor and Matthew Brook’s
commanding Zebul also deserve high
honours. A couple of caveats:
treatment of vocal ornamentation is
inconsistent and often imprecise, while
the inclusion of harp as well as theorbo
in the continuo is superfluous, making
for a curiously archaic texture.
However, these are relatively minor
details in the context of what is one of
the best things I’ve heard on disc from
Christophers. BR
Handel: The Triumph
of Time and Truth
Ludus Baroque,
Richard Neville-Towle (d)
Delphian DCD 34135

Space here does not allow for detail on
the complex history of Handel’s
allegorical moral oratorio. Suffice to
say that this is the 1757 English version
with the additional numbers the
composer added for a further
performance in 1758. Given that in
two cases we hear arias for the same
character clearly intended as
alternatives performed alongside each
other, the version given, which make
the performance some 30 minutes
longer than Denys Darlow’s 1982
Hyperion recording, is not entirely
convincing.
Nor is it just the extra music that is
responsible for the timing, since many
of Neville-Towle’s tempos in andantes
and largos are to my mind too slow,
at times painfully so. Otherwise his
direction tends to be neat, but staid,
at its best in the vibrantly sung
choruses. The two that start Act 2 go
especially well. The solo team will
doubtless go down well enough with
mainstream critics, but this being an
early music magazine I’m duty bound
to report that excessive vibrato is a
problem, especially with Ed Lyons’
Pleasure, and that the acoustic as
recorded allows the upper register of
Sophie Bevan’s Beauty to spread
alarmingly at times. Ornaments
(where there are any) are too often
imprecisely articulated, with trills as
rare as solar eclipses. Disappointing.
Stick with the Darlow if you already
have it. BR
In the Midst of Life –
Music from the Baldwin
Partbooks I
Contrapuntus,
Owen Rees (d)
Signum Classics
SIGCD408

This searingly beautiful album is the
first installment of a new recording
project by Contrapunctus
reconstructing and exploring repertoire
from the famous Baldwin Part-books,
an important preserve of Latin-texted
music spanning several generations of
Tudor composers. Each album will
explore a different religious theme:
in this present case, mortality. Happily,
such themes provide a structure
through which to hear lesser-known
works alongside those now firmly
established in the early music
‘canon’. For instance, this disc contains
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14/05/2015 16:29:11
 both John Sheppard’s well-known
and vast antiphon ‘Media Vita’, and
Dericke Gerarde’s delightful but
lesser-known ‘Sive vigilem’, both
wonderfully expressive settings.
Throughout the disc, Contrapunctus
offer some of the most unreservedly
beautiful performances of Tudor
polyphony of recent years with a near-
perfect blend of young, flexible voices
at the peak of their powers. I
particularly appreciate the firm
anchoring flow of the lower voices and
the eager polyphonic momentum
generated by the sprightly upper-
voices. Yet considering the wide range
of polyphonic styles covered, it is
surprising that Contrapunctus opt for
a similar intimate, nuanced sound
throughout. The results are expressive,
but contained. ‘Media vita’, in
particular, is rather too sepia-tinted for
my tastes. I prefer a more
demonstrative performance style for
larger-scale works. EB
1865 – Songs of Hope
and Home
Anonymous 4,
Bruce Molsky (fiddle,
banjo, guitar, vocals)
Harmonia Mundi HMU
807549

Anonymous 4 have long been
synonymous with searing, pure
performances of music from medieval
Europe, most notably that from
England and English manuscripts.
Now, having announced that the
2015–16 season will be their last, they
have also released their final studio
recording, commemorating the 150th
anniversary of the end of the American
Civil War through music connected to
that conflict. (The disc completes the
trilogy of recordings focusing on
music from the United States – the
earlier two, ‘American Angels’ and
‘Gloryland’ are also well worth seeking
out.) Rather than overtly militaristic
songs, however, the programme
consists of more personal accounts of
the war and its effects – there are a
number of old favourites here,
including ‘Abide with me’ and ‘Shall
we gather at the river?’, but also songs
which have slipped into obscurity
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EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 41
somewhat. It’s all very sentimental,
and movingly sung by the group
(Molsky adds his baritone to a number
of the tracks, but features primarily as
an instrumentalist), and the whole disc
is suffused with mellowness and a
gentle melancholy. This is an
understated, yet heartfelt, way to
signal the end of 30 years of glorious
music-making – exactly the qualities
that have distinguished Anonymous 4
since the beginning. AH
Music of the Realm:
Tudor Music for
Men’s Voices
The Queen’s Six
Resonus Classics RES10146

Six male voices, firmly rooted in the
English choral tradition, singing some
of the gems of the Tudor and Jacobean
repertoire: on receiving this disc by the
Queen’s Six, whose members are all lay
clerks in the choir of St George’s
Chapel, Windsor, I was immediately
reminded of ‘English Renaissance’,
a King’s Singers album from 1995
(and one of the first CDs I ever
bought!). Apart from the overlap of
only two works on both discs, the
similarities end there – except to say
that ‘Music of the Realm’ has given me
just as great listening pleasure as the
earlier album.
The Queen’s Six clearly have a great
love for this repertoire, and allied to
the bond that comes from working
together several times each week this
produces some glorious performances.
There are plenty of ‘greatest hits’
here – Byrd’s ‘Hæc dies’ and ‘O Lord,
make thy servant Elizabeth our
Queen’, Gibbons’ ‘Almighty and
everlasting God’, the settings of ‘When
David heard’ by Weelkes and Tomkins
– but the rarities receive no less care
from the ensemble. If ever there were a
disc to conjure up the magical
atmosphere of attending a choral
Evensong as the dusk draws in and the
light fades from the windows, this is it.
The recording is excellent, too, thanks
to the expert ears and hands of
Resonus’ co-founder Adam Binks,
capturing the voices and the warm
acoustic of St George’s Chapel
perfectly. AH
Winterreise: Lieder von
Schubert, Mendelssohn
und Chopin für das
Fortepiano übertragen
von Franz Liszt
Els Biesemans (f-piano)
Genuin Classics
GEN 14322

Liszt’s transcriptions for the piano of
choral and orchestral works by other
composers are well known and have
been recorded often – I first heard
some as part of Leslie Howard’s
monumental series on Hyperion, and
Cyprien Katsaris’ set of Beethoven’s
symphonies is a treasured possession
of mine – but recordings on historical
keyboards are as rare as hen’s teeth,
which makes this new recording by the
Belgian Els Biesemans particularly
welcome. The instrument is an 1835
model by Aloys Biber, and the
recorded sound shows it off to its best;
were the performances themselves
only run-of-the-mill, this disc would
still be worth a listen.
However, Biesemans plays superbly
in these arrangements of 25 songs,
showing us the truth in a
contemporary comment on Liszt, that
‘No singer can sing the way Liszt sings
on the piano’: these are not merely
literal transcriptions of the original
vocal line and piano part, but
inventive, even subversive,
reimaginings of the source material.
Twelve songs from Schubert’s
Winterreise form the bulk of the disc,
along with sets of pieces originally by
Chopin and Mendelssohn; single songs
by Schubert and Liszt himself bookend
the disc. While the use of period
pianos in 19th-century music is
becoming more and more prevalent,
I’d say that this disc is far and away
the most thrilling recording of one that
I’ve heard in a long while. AH
Marenzio: Quinto Libro
di Madrigali a sei voci
La Compagnia del
Madrigale
Glossa GCD 922804

Luca Marenzio is, for many, the
purist’s madrigal composer: a prime
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 41
18/05/2015 12:35:16
 Reviews: cds
exponent of the prima pratica (before
that upstart Monteverdi came along
and broke all the rules), but also
receptive of and responsive to the
latest compositional trends, his works
are perfectly formed and range from
the light and frothy to the wrought
and chromatic. He was certainly the
one composer in the genre whose fame
spread the farthest – the appearance of
his music in the 1588 Musica
Transalpina, published in London, was
hugely influential in sparking the
English craze for madrigals; and, had
he lived longer (he died aged 45),
would undoubtedly now share in the
wider renown enjoyed by Monteverdi
and Gesualdo.
The Italian madrigal super-group
La Compagnia del Madrigale won a
Gramophone Award for their recording
of Marenzio’s first book of five-part
madrigals, and now they turn to one of
the composer’s most innovative
collections. While they have illustrious
forebears in this repertoire – most
notably the Consort of Musicke,
Concerto Italiano and La Venexiana –
this album sets a new standard for
madrigal performance. The singing is
effortlessly serene and polished, yet
the voices can turn to harsh and
anguished in a split second when the
text demands it; the balance (both in
terms of volume and of importance of
the voices – the group credits no
conductor and jointly produced the
disc) is ideal; and Glossa’s customary
excellent engineering means that the
singers are captured beautifully. AH
Bach: St Matthew
Passion BWV 244b
(early version)
Charles Daniels
(Evangelist), Peter Harvey
(Christus), Yorkshire
Baroque Soloists,
Peter Seymour (d)
Signum Classics SIGCD385

Most scholars agree that Bach’s
supreme setting of the Passion story
was probably first performed on Good
Friday 1727. While the original
manuscript score and performing parts
have been lost, the survival of several
later sources make it possible to
42 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 42
reconstruct the work’s first version and
compare it with Bach’s 1736 autograph
score, the version commonly heard
today. Yorkshire Baroque Soloists and
Peter Seymour offer a recording of the
1726/7 score that underlines the genius
of a composer working in a genre still
new to him. Their compelling vision of
the work manages to project its human
drama while intensifying its profound
reverence. Charles Daniels and Peter
Harvey, as Evangelist and Jesus, invest
decades of experience into conveying
the pain and reflecting on the essential
message of Christ’s Passion.
The triumph of this interpretation
rises from the Yorkshire Baroque
Soloists’ vital engagement with words
and their imaginative expression.
Bach’s Passion hymns, several
accompanied by organ alone, stand
here as moments of heightened ritual,
intense and incisive in their delivery.
The same conviction flows through the
pithy secco recitative accompaniments
and wholehearted instrumental
playing. Seymour’s fine soloists, Sally
Bruce Payne and Matthew Brook
outstanding among them, work in
harness with his band as a consort of
equals, moving with ease from
recitatives and arias to choruses and
chorales. Single strings and a rich
complement of continuo instruments
reinforce the recording’s irresistible
spirit of chamber music-making. AS
Le Llibre Vermeil de
Montserrat
La Camera delle Lacrime,
Bruno Bonhoure,
Khaï-dong Luong (dirs)
Paraty 414125

Bruno Bonhoure tells us that ‘his stage
presence and his personality make him
one of the most captivating French
tenors on stage today’. Khaï-Dong
Luong – whose credit for ‘conception
artistique’ is due to his responsibility
for the staging of the live concert
recorded here – ‘surprises and
innovates by […] brushing aside
convention’. These descriptions seem
to support my suspicions that this disc
says more about the performers than
the repertoire. This is in principle no
bad thing: in a sense, all contemporary
performances of medieval repertoire
will do so, and thoughtful and off-the-
beaten-track performances of familiar
repertoire are a joy. I do not wish by
any means to represent the
‘authenticity police’. It’s just that the
recasting of the round-dance
‘Polorum regina’ as slow, ambient,
crooning ‘mood-music’ seems a step
too far in terms of disregard for the
purpose and structure of the tune;
and the self-conscious popstar-isms
of ‘Cuncti simus concanentes’ here
do rather inspire amusement than
religious fervour.
The Jeune chœur de Dordogne
portrays the responding pilgrims. Their
handling of the tricky intonational
issues in the Llibre Vermell’s opening ‘O
Virgo splendens’ is impressive. There is
some excellent playing, too, from La
Camera delle Lacrime.
The disc ends, incongruously, with
‘Els segadors’, a lament recalling the
Catalans’ 1640 revolt which is now
Catalonia’s national anthem. This is
justified by the contextualisation of the
Llibre Vermell’s songs as a continuing
strong element of Catalan identity, and
for my money, it’s the most successful
track on the album. CG
Piffarissimo:
Instrumental music at
the Council of
Constance 1414–1418
Capella de la Torre,
Katharina Bäuml
Challenge Classics
CC72631

Another first-rate disc from Katharina
Bäuml and Capella de la Torre. Lute
and percussion are added to their
shawms, sackbuts and slide trumpets
here to invoke some small part of the
auditory cornucopia that might have
been heard by the 50,000 participants
of The Council of Constance –
including Oswald von Wolkenstein,
represented here – on occasions
ranging from the procession in honour
of King Sigismund’s entry for the
Christmas festivities of 1415, to solemn
invocations to the Holy Spirit to come
down and assist with the matter of the
three simultaneously functioning
popes of the Great Western Schism.
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 17:22:54

More than 30 languages were spoken
by these participants and the musical
cultures of a great many of these lands
were represented by prestigious alta
cappella ensembles.
Capella de la Torre arrange their
repertoire into six sections: Entry of
the Musicians and Invocation to the
Holy Ghost; sections dedicated to the
music of the French, the Italians, the
British and the Germans; and a jam
session showcasing their formidable
skills in improvising on tenors and
dance tunes.
Intonation is dazzlingly accurate
throughout, and the ensemble’s sound-
palette is a veritable kaleidoscope
ranging from dazzling brightness
(Dufay’s ‘Gloria ad modum tubae’) to
the intricacy and clarity (Guglielmo
Ebreo’s Ballo ‘Petit Vriens’) to caressing
warmth and tenderness (the
anonymous ‘Auxce bon youre
delabonestren’).
Other composers whose music is
featured here include Philippe de
Vitry, Domenico da Piacenza, Gilles
Binchois, John Bedingham and Antonio
Cornazano. Highly recommended. CG
The Elizabethan
Session
Martin Simpson, Nancy
Kerr, Jim Moray, Bella
Hardy, John Smith, Emily
Askew, Hannah James,
Rachel Newton
Quercus Records QRCD001

This fascinating and important disc is
the fruit of a project commissioned
jointly by Folk By The Oak and the
English Folk Dance and Song Society,
wherein, in early 2014, eight of the
contemporary folk scene’s leading
artists spent a week living and writing
together, taking the music, the people,
the myths and the stories of the
Elizabethan age as their inspiration.
Most of the music and lyrics here are
original composition by the artists,
occasionally taking a fragment of an
Elizabethan source (snatches of text by
Amelia Lanyer, Christopher Marlowe
and Walter Raleigh; a passamezzo
ground with Ortiz diminutions) as a
basis or starting point. The disc is a
sort of collage of pictures of
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 43
Elizabethan England, with the subjects
covered as diverse as a female
perspective on the African slave trade
(‘The Shores Of Hispaniola’),
Shakespeare’s Hermia (‘Love-in-
Idleness’), and John Dee’s algebra
and occultism (‘The Straight Line
And The Curve’).
Both the writing and the rendering
are, of course – given the lineup – of
astonishing quality; and it seems
arbitrary, in such a short review, to
privilege any individual or
individuals. Suffice it to say that the
kaleidoscopic sound-palette available
to the line-up is one of the great
strengths of the disc, with particularly
spine-tingling moments coming from
John Smith’s vocal on ‘London’; from
the deeply unsettling low recorder on
‘Elizabeth Spells Death’, as Elizabeth
signs and re-signs her cousin’s death-
warrant; and from the harp and bells
on ‘Come Live With Me’. Superb. CG
The Music of the
Habsburg Empire
Ars Antiqua Austria,
Gunar Letzbor (vln, d)
Pan Classics PC 10311
(10 CDs)

This ten CD anthology of 17th- and
18th-century music of the Habsburg
Empire was ten years in the making.
Director and violinist Gunar Letzbor
takes us on a journey through cities
and countries associated with or which
were part of the Empire tracing roots
and exposing influences which had a
bearing on a characteristic Austrian
baroque idiom. The journey is a
fascinating one even if, on occasion,
our credulity is gently tweaked. While
most of the great names – Biber, Fux,
Schemlzer and co, are featured in the
programming, they take their place
modestly in a rich, varied and often
comparatively obscure context.
The journey begins in Slovakia and
Slovenia from where Letzbor uncovers
an attractive suite of dances by Georg
Daniel Speer, and movements from
one of Kusser’s suites belonging to his
Festin des Muses. Among a group of
miscellaneous songs and dances
‘Vrcharska nalada’ is especially
evocative. Only a plate of goulash and
Reviews: cds
a jug of local wine are needed to
complete the picture. A complex violin
sonata by Tartini with an extended and
impressive finale makes a surprise
appearance which is not explained.
Presumably such virtuosity was part of
the cultural exchange and the piece
certainly provides a focal point in an
otherwise mixed bag.
Hungary and Poland yield greater
riches with a colourful ‘Sinfonia by
Fux’, a lively dance suite by Schmelzer,
a group of catchy Hungarian dances
and four strophic hymns with Latin
texts for solo voice with
accompaniment by Pál Esterházy. This
artistic member of the clan was son of
Nikolaus Esterházy, palatine of
Hungary. Among smaller items are two
dances from Haydn’s keyboard
‘Zingarese’, a motet by his Eisenstadt
predecessor Werner, excerpts from a
lute suite by Weiss and pieces from
Speer’s ‘Musikalisch-Türkischer
Eulenspiegel’. One of these is a song
whose character foreshadows the
manner of arias in Telemann’s operas.
Bohemia and Moravia fare less well
than the remainder of the programme.
Notwithstanding a Sonata a 3 with
horns (Anon), an interesting
harpsichord sonata by J. S. Bach’s
contemporary Stölzel and movements
from a lute suite by Bohemian
nobleman (the French preferred to call
him le Comte de Logis), Johan Anton
Losy – the allegretto and adagio
arpeggiato are erroneously printed in
the reverse order – there is little else of
noteworthiness. Furthermore, there is a
plethora of applause and lengthy,
tiresome German spoken dialogue on
the Moravian disc.
The principal attractions of the
Spanish disc are pieces by Nicola
Matteis which include a well-
constructed Chaconne, music by
Emperor Leopold I, dances by
Giovanni Maria Pagliardi and a
potpourri from Viviani’s opera El
Prometeo, staged in Vienna in 1672. If
Moravia represented a nadir in the
proceedings Venice (CD 8) soared to
the other end of the scale. The main
protagonists here are oboist Andrea
Mion and soprano Radu Marian.
Instrumental highlights include a trio
sonata by Vivaldi for violin, oboe and
obbligato organ (RV 779) and an oboe
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday 43
18/05/2015 12:24:40
 Reviews: cds/BOOKS
sonata in C major by Albinoni. Four
anonymous canzonette from ‘Raccolta
del Gondoliere’ and a ballad by
Lampugnani are sung with youthful,
ingenuous charm and with well-nigh
faultless intonation.
From Venice we move on to Rome,
whose programme is dominated by an
extended and beautifully crafted
Chaconne for violin and continuo by
Carlo Lonati. Letzbor plays it with
stylistic assurance though his
intonation is not invariably secure.
Other items of interest include an
arrangement for solo harpsichord of
the celebrated Passacaglia from Georg
Muffat’s fifth ‘sonata’ of his Armonico
Tributo (1682) and keyboard pieces by
Stradella and Kerll.
Finally, we reach Paris, the Bourbon
melting-pot whose monarch, Louis XIV
and his court were widely
acknowledged arbiters of good taste.
Lully, the King’s musical
superintendant makes only a brief
rather insignificant appearance while
Muffat, one of the Lullistes is
honoured with a suite from his
Florilegium Secundum (1698), Fux by
three pieces from his collection
Concentus Musico-Instrumentalis, and
Johann von Ehrenstein with an
books
REVIEWERS: Nicholas Anderson, Ed Breen, Catherine Groom, Adrian Horsewood, Graham Lock, Brian Robins, Andrew Seymour, Andrew Stewart.
44 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_036-044_R_Reviews.indd 44
instrumental suite containing a
splendid Passacaille.
In summary, this is a rewarding
enterprise, well performed and
sympathetically recorded.
Documentation, though is too sketchy
and inconsistent. If you want to know
who on earth is Herr von Ehrenstein
you will have to look elsewhere. These
matters apart, there is plenty to
discover in a well-constructed
anthology. NA
A Royal Trio – Arias by
Handel, Bononcini &
Ariosti
Lawrence Zazzo (c-t),
La Nuova Musica, David
Bates (d)
Harmonia Mundi HMU
807590

This royal trio are not operatic kings,
but the composers named above, the
principal contributors to the Royal
Academy of Music, founded in London
in 1719. Handel needs no introduction,
but today we enjoy only scant
acquaintance with the operas of
Giovanni Bononcini and even less with
those of Attilio Ariosti (1666–1729).
The Supernatural Voice: A History of
High Male Singing
by Simon Ravens
Boydell Press
ISBN 978-1-84383-962-0
A listener to Alfred Deller’s 1940s radio
broadcasts decried his countertenor
voice as ‘just another gimmick thought
up by the BBC’. The voice wasn’t a
gimmick, but defining it as
‘countertenor’ was an historical faux pas
by Michael Tippett, who mistakenly
believed Deller’s was the kind of voice
‘for which Purcell had written’.
Nonetheless, thanks to Deller’s celebrity,
‘countertenor’, a term which, as Simon
Ravens notes, had become ‘virtually
obsolete’, re-entered public discourse
and today is commonly associated with
much early music that was probably
composed with other voices in mind.
One of the fascinating aspects of this
imaginatively conceived CD is the
opportunity it provides to compare
composers working conjointly for the
same theatre, not least in two of the
most imposing excerpts on the disc,
those taken from Handel’s Ottone
(January 1723) and Ariosti’s Coriolano
(February 1723). Both inhabit the same
bleak world of hopelessness, given
voice in a remarkable chromatically
inflected accompagnato followed by an
aria of profound grief, here
unforgettably intensified further in the
da capo by Zazzo.
In a world awash with fine
countertenors Lawrence Zazzo is one
of its aristocrats. The possessor of a
voice of natural beauty and an
enviable ease of production, he is on
excellent form, singing with noble tone
and dramatic conviction. Passaggi are
executed with exemplary articulation
with only the odd uneasily turned
ornament (especially trills) detracting
from a vibrantly sung recital. Zazzo
is given fine support by Bates and
the excellent La Nuova Musica,
though I don’t care for the mannered,
choppy rhythm of ‘Va tacito’
(Giulio Cesare) or the obtrusive
theorbo continuo. BR
Such shifts of meaning explain why
Ravens insists his scholarly study of
what he carefully terms the ‘high male’
voice is not so concerned with what that
voice is, as with what it has been – in all
its many guises. He traces this history
through slippery categories such as
‘alto’, ‘falsetto’ and ‘countertenor’,
explicating how their meanings varied in
different places and different times,
although his main focus remains the
classical tradition during the
Renaissance and baroque periods in
England and continental Europe. Brief
‘Extempore’ sections consider various
extra-musical factors, from gender
identity to the importance of height, that
have affected the production and
reception of the voice. It’s a convoluted
story, but Ravens unravels it with
admirable clarity in this fascinating and
impressive book. GL
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 18:30:51
 Mozart′s Requiem
Truth and Legend
Mozart’s Requiem is fraught This high-quality new facsimile presents
with questions and emotions: each page individually trimmed to
the expressive depth of its music, convey a vivid impression of the original.
sorrow at the great composer’s early Besides a detailed description of
death, truth and legend, fragments the manuscript by Günter Brosche,
and attempts to complete the work. the volume contains a Foreword by
The surviving manuscript reflects its Christoph Wolff depicting the work’s
dramatic history: genesis.
Mozart’s handwriting often appears
on the same page Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
as inscriptions Requiem K. 626 NEW
by Süssmayr Facsimile of the autograph score
and others. held in the Austrian National Library
With a commentary by Christoph Wolff
and Günter Brosche
200 pp. of facsimile, individually trimmed
and 35 pp. of Commentary (Eng/Ger)
Half-leather binding · BVK 2346
Pages individually trimmed

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 LISTINGS
5 TOP
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EVENTS
NORTH
BERWICK-UPON-TWEED
EVENTS Paxton House
0131 473 2000,
NOT TO MISS musicatpaxton.co.uk
Experience music as it would have
been enjoyed in Dowland’s time:
OUR SUMMER RECOMMENDATIONS seated around a table, sampling
FROM ACROSS THE COUNTRY refreshments of the house;
Les Canards Chantants, Jacob
SAINTS AND ANGELS Heringman (lt)
18 July, Minster, Kings Lynn 19 July: 2.30pm
Violinist Bojan Čičić leads the Academy of Ancient Music in
a programme of baroque concertos inspired by guardian BOLTON ABBEY
angels and by the lives and deeds of holy men and women. Priory Church of St Mary and
Composers featured include Vivaldi, Biber and Manfredini. St Cuthbert
01756 752691,
LORD OF THE DANCE www.grassington-festival.org.uk
21 June, All Saints’ Church, Boughton Aluph Purcell Dido and Æneas, Pergolesi
In 1600 the actor, fool and lively lad around town Stabat Mater; Armonico Consort,
Will Kempe carried out an audacious publicity stunt by Christopher Monks (d),
dancing his way from London to Norwich in a week and Elin Manahan Thomas (sop)
two days – the ‘Nine Daies Wonder’ that the Society 21 June: 8pm
of Strange and Ancient Instruments celebrate in a
kaleidoscope of music and dance. BUXTON
Opera House
MONTEVERDI AND THE MODERN 0845 127 2190,
3–5 July, Wigmore Hall, London www.buxtonoperahouse.org.uk
Monteverdi was revolutionary in the way he broke Purcell Dido and Æneas (semi-
compositional rules with his madrigals in the first decade of staged); the English Concert,
the 17th century. Now his achievements are set alongside Erebus Ensemble, Harry Bicket
those of masters of the 20th-century avant-garde, in a series (d), Susanna Hurrell (Dido),
of concerts and events including music by Piazolla, David Stout (Æneas), Mary Bevan
Schoenberg, Pärt and Tavener. (Belinda), Hilary Summers
(Sorceress)
ILL-FATED LOVERS 13, 20 July: 7.15pm
5 July, Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall, York Handel, Telemann, Gabrielli,
Christian Curnyn directs his Early Opera Company in a Aldrovandini; the English Concert
double-bill of Purcell’s Dido and Æneas and Charpentier’s 14 July: 12pm
Actéon; the casts include Emilie Renard and Callum Thorpe Purcell, Handel, Telemann,
in the title roles of the former, and Hillary Summers as Vivaldi; the English Concert
Junon to Ed Lyon’s Actéon. 21 July: 12pm
Vivaldi The Four Seasons, and for
JOAN OF ARC – SILENT NO LONGER the first time since the 18th
7 August, Town Hall, Kendal century two concertos for
Carl Theodor Dreyer’s silent film La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc ‘prepared violin’, the violin in
was a critical success in 1928, and is still considered one of tromba marina, having recreated
the greatest films of its age. Donald Greig of the Orlando this curious and loud instrument
Consort has devised a programme of 15th-century sacred from evidence surviving in the
and secular vocal music to be performed live by the archives of the Ospedale della
ensemble alongside a screening of the film. Pietà; La Serenissima
22 July: 7.30pm
46 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015
EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 46
CARLISLE
Cathedral
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip back
to 16th-century Spain and more
specifically to Seville; the
Sixteen, Harry Christophers (d)
10 July: 7.30pm
KENDAL
Town Hall
01539 742621, www.ldsm.org.uk
Lake District Summer Music
International Festival: a screening
of Dreyer’s 1928 silent film
La Passion de Jeanne d’Arc with
a live performance of
15th-century sacred and
secular vocal music to amplify
the powerful portrayal of Joan’s
trial and execution and provide a
unique and evocative
accompaniment; the Orlando
Consort
7 August: 8pm
LANCASTER
Priory
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip
back to 16th-century Spain and
more specifically to Seville; the
Sixteen, Harry Christophers (d)
9 July: 7.30pm
LEEDS
University Catholic
Chaplaincy
0113 243 8263, www.uilcc.org
Songs that challenge the
supreme authority of kings,
criticise the Roman Curia, and
highlight the lives, loves,
imprisonment and taxation of
ordinary folk (or barons) at the
time of the Great Charter,
performed on medieval harps,
fidel, lute, percussion, bagpipes,
and voices; Joglaresa
7 July: 8.30pm
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 17:50:43

MALTON
Castle Howard
01751 475777, ryedalefestival.com
A programme of Compline music
ranging from simple hymns to
complex webs of polyphony,
culminating in John Taverner’s
votive antiphon, Ave Dei patris
filia; Stile Antico
23 July: 7pm
ULVERSTON
Coronation Hall
01539 742621, www.ldsm.org.uk
Lake District Summer Music
International Festival: Pergolesi
Stabat mater, Purcell Dido and
Æneas; Armonico Consort and
Baroque Players, Christopher
Monks (d), Eloise Irving, Penelope
Appleyard (sops), William Towers
(c-t), Gareth John (bar)
1 August: 8pm
WINDERMERE
Carver Church
01539 742621, www.ldsm.org.uk
Lake District Summer Music
International Festival: an uplifting
celebration of music spanning the
length and breadth of the British
Isles, including Lisa Lân, Loch
Lomond and Greensleeves, plus a
specially commissioned
arrangement by Toby Young of the
Cumbrian folksong Horn of the
Hunter; Armonico Consort
2 August: 3pm
YORK
All Saints Church, North
Street
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: the
history of the ballade form during
the late-medieval period,
featuring composers such as
Guillaume de Machaut, Pierre
des Molins, Johannes Cuvelier,
Antonello da Caserta, Arnold de
Lantins, John Bedyngham and
others; La Morra
7 July: 2pm
Beddern Hall
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: David
Fallows, Emeritus professor of
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EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 47
musicology at the University of
Manchester, introduces Firminus
Caron, who until recently was the
15th century’s most elusive and
hard-to-identify composer, and
explains how he has now
emerged as a major figure
6 July: 10.30am
Guildhall
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: English
and French baroque chamber
music by John Jenkins, William
Lawes, Jean-Marie Leclair, Marin
Marais and Jean-Philippe Rameau;
Kati Debretzeni (vln), Richard
Boothby (bass vln), Mahan
Esfahani (hpsd, org)
4 July: 3pm
York Early Music Festival: Sally
Dunkley and Bruno Turner, in the
company of a consort of singers,
lead an insight day into the music
of this year’s Choral Pilgrimage by
the Sixteen
8 July: 1pm
Minster
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: the
historic meeting of Henry VIII and
Francis I at ‘the Field of the Cloth
of Gold’ in 1520 gave the
musicians of two Chapels Royal a
rare opportunity to hear each
other in action. This concert
David Bates leads La Nuova Musica as associate artists at the Spitalfields Summer Festival
listings june–august 2015
interlaces Taverner’s Western
Wind Mass and Crecquillon’s
Missa Domine Deus omnipotens
with French secular chansons and
intimate English songs; Taverner
Consort & Choir, Andrew Parrott
(d), Emily Van Evera (sop)
4 July: 7.30pm
York Early Music Festival:
movements from five of Firminus
Caron’s masses and a selection of
his virtuosic secular chansons;
Huelgas Ensemble
6 July: 7.30pm
York Early Music Festival: Flight of
Angels: music by Guerrero and
Lobo – a trip back to 16th-century
Spain and more specifically to
Seville; the Sixteen, Harry
Christophers (d)
8 July: 7.30pm
York Early Music Festival: marking
the anniversary of the Battle of
Agincourt in 1415 with music
associated with the court of
Henry V and with the battle itself;
the Clerks, Edward Wickham (d)
9 July: 7.30pm
National Centre for Early
Music
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: Andreas
Staier (hpsd) explores two great
17th-century national harpsichord
traditions in works by the English
composers John Bull, William Byrd
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday
and Henry Purcell, and the
Frenchmen Chambonnières,
D’Anglebert and Louis Couperin
4 July: 11am
York Early Music Festival: Sylvia
Abramowicz and Jonathan
Dunford (bass viol) are joined by
their son Thomas Dunford (lt, bar
guitar) in works from Marais’s
First and Second Books of Pièces
de viole
5 July: 9.45pm
York Early Music Festival: dance
music from Rameau’s last opera,
Les Boréades, is heard alongside
Purcell’s distinctively English
take on the genre in his ‘Ayres
for the Theatre’ and Jean-Féry
Rebel’s innovative ballet
Les Caractères de la danse;
University of York Baroque
Ensemble, Compagnia
d’Instrumenti, Nia Lewis, Daniel
Edgar, Tim Smedley (d)
6 July: 2pm
York Early Music Festival: the
Rose Consort of Viols presents a
selection of chansons, including
works by Certon, Sandrin,
Sermisy as well as elegant French
dances, and instrumental music by
Queen Elizabeth’s own court
composers Tallis, Parsons and
Byrd
7 July: 6.30pm
York Early Music Festival: the
Orlando Consort presents an
Alys Tomlinson
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 listings june–august 2015
entirely new soundtrack of
music from the era in which the
1928 film La Passion de Jeanne
D’Arc is set. 15th-century works
by Binchois and Dufay, together
with animated motets and
haunting plainsong, amplify the
poignant depiction of medieval
France and provide a highly
evocative accompaniment to
this film
7 July: 9.30pm
York Early Music Festival: Dibdin,
Linley, Attwood, Pinto, Bishop,
Wesley and Haydn; James Gilchrist
(ten), Peter Seymour (piano)
8 July: 11am
York Early Music Festival:
emerging ensembles from the UK,
the USA and from across Europe
present a series of preliminary
recitals in advance of the 2015
International Young Artists
Competition. Introduced by singer
and broadcaster Catherine Bott
9 July: 10.15am; 10 July: 10.30am
York Early Music Festival: York
Early Music International Young
Artists Competition 2015;
Catherine Bott (presenter)
11 July: 10am
St Mary’s Church Bishophill
Junior
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: Alex
McCartney (lt) showcases the
quality of the professional lutenists
who worked in and around the
court of Elizabeth I
8 July: 10pm
Spiritato! feature at this summer’s Stroud Green Festival
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EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 48
St Michael le Belfrey Church
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
Purcell Dido and Æneas, with odes
and string anthems; Yorkshire
Bach Choir and Soloists
20 June: 7.30pm
Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival: Louis
XIV’s passion for dance inspired
composers throughout Europe.
Rediscovering the nature of these
distinctive dances has led to a
reassessment of their music and a
fresh perspective on the great
composers who wrote them,
including Lully, Rebel, Handel and
Corelli; London Handel Players
3 July: 7.30pm
York Early Music Festival: baroque
operatic double-bill, Purcell’s Dido
and Æneas, and Charpentier’s
Actéon; Early Opera Company,
Christian Curnyn (d), Ed Lyon
(Actéon), Emilie Renard (Dido),
Callum Thorpe, (Æneas), Hilary
Summers (Junon, Sorceress)
5 July: 6.30pm
York Early Music Festival: organ
music of the French baroque,
Couperin Messe pour les Paroisses:
Offertoire sur les Grand Jeux,
Clérambault Suite du deuxième
ton, Daquin Suite de Noëls; Ben
Horden (org)
10 July: 6pm
York Early Music Festival: Couperin,
Montéclair, Jacquet de La Guerre;
Yorkshire Baroque Soloists
10 July: 7.30pm
St Olave’s Church, Marygate
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
A Tudor Revel: late 15th- and
16th-century dances, songs and
other diverse music, played on
shawms, sackbut, recorders,
fiddles, rebec, harps, bagpipes,
hurdy gurdy and pipe and tabor;
the York Waits, Deborah
Catterall
26 June: 7.30pm
Unitarian Chapel,
St Saviourgate
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
York Early Music Festival:
looking at Purcell’s inspirations
and legacies across both England
and France; the Minstrels,
students from the University of
York Baroque Ensemble
5 July: 4pm
MIDLANDS
BIRMINGHAM
Symphony Hall
0121 345 0603, www.thsh.co.uk
Tallis, Taverner, Mouton, Pärt,
Sheppard, Allegri; the Tallis
Scholars, Peter Phillips (d)
4 June: 7.30pm
COVENTRY
Cathedral
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip back
to 16th-century Spain and more
specifically to Seville; the
Sixteen, Harry Christophers (d)
13 June: 7.30pm
FOTHERINGHAY
St Mary and All Saints
Church
01832 274734,
www.oundlefestival.org.uk
Music from the Sadler
partbooks: Thomas Tallis O
sacrum convivium, Salvator mundi,
Philip van Wilder Aspice,
Domine, William Byrd Domine
praestolamur, White Exaudiat
te, Dominus, John Taverner  Concerto in E major, RV265),
Ave Dei Patris filia. Plus organ
works from the period;
Stile Antico
16 July: 7.30pm
MALVERN
Theatres
01684 892277,
www.malvern-theatres.co.uk
Recreation of the coronation
service of Henry VIII in 1509 with
music by Fayrfax and Taverner;
Armonico Consort, Christopher
Monks (d)
3 June: 7.45pm
NORTHAMPTON
St Matthew’s Church
www.annekescott.com/songsoflove
Schubert, Gallay, Czerny, Rossini,
Mendelssohn and Moscheles;
Anneke Scott (natural horn),
Steven Devine (Pleyel grand piano
1887)
2 June: 7.30pm
LONDON
CENTRAL
The British Library
01937 546546, boxoffice@bl.uk
On the anniversary of the signing
of Magna Carta, Joglaresa present
a special lunchtime concert using
harp, fidel, percussion, bagpipes
and voice as they perform songs
highlighting the lives, loves,
imprisonment and taxation of
ordinary folk (and barons) at the
time of the Great Charter
15 June: 1pm
Handel House
020 7399 1953,
www.handelhouse.org
A programme of songs composed
1601–1710 including music by
Eccles and Clarke from the 1698
publication The a la mode
Musician, and music written by
Corkine and Jones alongside music
by Henry and Daniel Purcell, with
a solo cello sonata by Galli; Arcata
Duo, Elin Harries (sop), Carina
Drury (cello)
4 June: 7.30pm
Transcriptions for harpsichord by
J. S. Bach: Concerto in C major,
BWV976 (after Vivaldi Violin
Concerto in G minor, BWV985
(after Telemann Violin Concerto in
G minor, TWV51:g1), Sonata in D
minor, BWV964 (after Sonata for
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14/05/2015 17:51:58

Solo Violin in A minor, BWV1003),
Italian Concerto BWV971; Tom
Foster (hpsd)
9 June: 6.30pm
Compositions by Italian
composers and arrangers from
the 16th century and English
composers from the virginalist
school, with special focus on the
earliest keyboard music print;
Catalina Vicens (hpsd)
11 June: 6.30pm
Music from London and Paris in
the period leading up to the loss
of the British colonies in America
in 1776 and the French Revolution
in 1789, J. C. Bach, John Stanley,
Johann Schobert, Claude-Bénigne
Balbastre and Jacques Duphly; Yeo
Yat-Soon (hpsd)
18 June: 6.30pm
Come and sing Handel’s Israel in
Egypt; Laurence Cummings (d),
Handel House Singers (choir),
Belsize Baroque (orchestra)
20 June: 10am
Handel Israel in Egypt; Laurence
Cummings (d)
20 June: 6pm
Corelli and J. S. Bach; John
Crockatt (vln), Tom Foster (hpsd)
25 June: 6.30pm
Handel’s intimate chamber
cantatas for solo soprano; Ars
Eloquentiae, Erica Eloff (sop), Leo
Duarte (oboe), James Toll (vln),
Chad Kelly (hpsd)
2 July: 6.30pm
Songs and duets written by Peri
and Monteverdi for various
operatic pairings, accompanied on
archlute and bass; Helen Atkinson
(sop), Melissa Scott (m-sop), Esha
Neogy (bass viol), Din Ghani (lt,
archlute)
9 July: 6.30pm
Anhad Arora (hpsd) performs some
of J. S. Bach’s most beloved works
using a delicate performing style
aptly named ‘the singing brook’
14 July: 6.30pm
Music for lyra viol: Tobias Hume,
William Lawes, Carl Frederick
Abel; Richard Boothby (viols)
16 July: 6.30pm
The Chaconne and the Passacaille
were two popular styles of music
in the baroque period. Satoko
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EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 49
Doi-Luck (hpsd) presents a
programme that compares
Couperin’s Chaconne ou
Passacaille, Duphly’s Chacconne
and Passacaille from Handel’s G
minor Suite to investigate the
distinction of each style
23 July: 6.30pm  Eboracum Baroque are joined by
Young composers explore the use
of imagery painted in Handel’s
Sweet Bird from L’Allegro, il
Penseroso ed il Moderato to create
their own setting of the same text
by poet John Milton. The
culmination of a week-long
summer school supervised by
composer-in-residence Edwin
Hillier and composer Michael
Andrews, the group will present
their compositions written for
Cathy Bell (m-sop), Caoimhe da
Paor (recs) and Nathaniel Mander
(hpsd) to perform live
30 July: 6.30pm
Ensemble de Trianon present
pieces composed by some the
virtuosi that performed Telemann’s
Quartets in Paris alongside two of
his Quartets; Yu-Wei Hu (fl),
Magdalena Loth-Hill (vln), George
Ross (cello), Aidan Phillips (hpsd)
6 August: 6.30pm
Using the music of J. S. Bach,
Handel and Fischer, Paolo Zanzu
(hpsd) explores the portrayal of
light and shade in music written
before the ‘Sturm und Drang’
style of later 18th-century
composers
11 August: 6.30pm
Explore the influence of the Italian
cantata across Europe featuring
music by Pepusch, D Scarlatti,
Boimortier, Stanley and Handel;
Arcata Baroque, Elin Harries
(sop), Carina Drury (cello)
Nathaniel Mander (hpsd)
13 August: 6.30pm
Dowland, Frescobaldi, David
Kellner – representing all three
major schools of that time;
Andreas Moutsioulis (guitar)
20 August: 6.30pm
Music by composers who were
contemporaries of artists such as
Watteau, Boucher and Fragonard.
In addition to music for violin and
basso continuo, there are two
listings june–august 2015
early examples of works for violin
and obbligato harpsichord,
including excerpts from Troisième
Livre by Jacques Duphly; Duo
Follia, Diane Moore (vln), Yeo Yat-
Soon (hpsd)
27 August: 6.30pm
Horrible Histories author, Terry
Deary to guide us through a
London that Handel would have
known
30 August: 6.30pm
Milton Court Concert Hall
020 7638 8891,
www.barbican.org,uk
Mozart Overture to Lucio Silla
(1772), Concerto No.5 in D major
(early version for organ, 1773),
Mozart arr. Levin Allegro to a
keyboard concerto in G major,
Symphony No.29 in A major
(1774), J. C. Bach arr. Mozart
Harpsichord concerto in D major
K107/1 (1772); Academy of
Ancient Music, Pavlo Beznosiuk (d,
vln), Robert Levin (d, vln, org)
6 July: 7.30pm
Queen Elizabeth Hall
0871 663 2500,
www.southbankcentre.co.uk
Mozart Requiem and Clarinet
Concerto, Haydn Trumpet
Concerto in E flat; English Arts
Orchestra, Leslie Olive (d), Anna
Hashimoto (clarinet), Crispian
Steele-Perkins (tr), Fiona
Campbell (sop), Jane Haughton
(m-sop), Ben Thapa (ten), Njabulo
Madlala (bar), English Arts Chorale
9 June: 7.30pm
Tunisian, classical and Arabic music
(malouf), dating back to
15th-century courts in Andalusia,
malouf has long been an emblem
of Tunisian national identity
13 June: 7.45pm
St John’s Smith Square
020 7222 1061, www.sjss.org.uk
John Sheppard, Arvo Pärt; the
Erebus Ensemble
4 June: 1.05pm
Bach St Matthew Passion; Tilford
Bach Society, London Handel
Orchestra, Children from
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday
Edgeborough School, Joanne
Lunn, Elizabeth Cragg (sop),
Daniel Taylor, Robin Blaze
(c-t),Charles Daniels, Mark Wilde
(ten), Benjamin Appl, Edward
Grint (bass), Adrian Butterfield
(d)
16 June: 7pm
Georg Muffat, Toccata VIII
(1690), Capriccio desperato,
Pachelbel Fantasia in Eb,
Clérambault Suite du deuzième
ton, Kolb, Praeludium Tertium,
Stanley, Voluntary in D Minor
Op.6 No.5 Russell, Voluntary X
in G; Patrick Russill (org)
18 June: 1.03pm
Handel Joshua: an exploration of
Handel’s oratorios; the Holst
Singers, the Brook Street Band,
Stephen Layton (d),Rachel
Ambrose Evans,(sop), Alex Potter
(c-t), Nicholas Mulroy (ten)
20 June: 7.30pm
Corelli, Handel, Vivaldi, Leclair;
the Brook Street Band, Rachel
Harris, Farran Scott (vln), Tatty
Theo (cello), Carolyn Gibley
(hpsd). Introductory talk at
2.15pm
21 June: 3pm
Purcell King Arthur; Gabrieli, Paul
McCreesh (d), Sophie Junker,
Grace Davidson (sops), Nicholas
Mulroy (ten), Marcus Farnsworth,
Ashley Riches (baritones)
16 July: 7pm
St Martin-in-the-Fields
020 7222 1061, www.smitf.org
Handel Coronation Anthems; St
Martin’s Voices, Andrew Earis (d)
5 June: 7.30pm
Mozart Flute Quartet in D,
Salzburg Symphony No.1 in D,
Haydn Symphony No.101 in D
The Clock, Symphony No.100 in
G The Military; the Feinstein
Ensemble, Martin Feinstein (d)
18 June: 7.30pm
Bach The Musical Offering; the
Feinstein Ensemble, Martin
Feinstein (d)
9 July: 7.30pm
Telemann, Handel, Bach; the
Feinstein Ensemble, Martin
Feinstein (fl, rec, d)
28 July: 7.30pm
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 listings june–august 2015
Bach Orchestral Suite in B minor,
Brandenburg Concerto No.4 and
No.5, Handel Concerto Grosso in
G Op.3 No.3, Vivaldi Flute
Concerto Il Gardellino, Telemann
Concerto in D minor for
Recorder and 2 Violins; the
Feinstein Ensemble, Catherine
Manson (vln), Robin Bigwood
(hpsd), Martin Feinstein (fl, rec, d)
21 August: 7.30pm
St Olave’s Church
www.sanctuaryinthecity.net,
www.annekescott.com/songsoflove
Schubert, Gallay, Czerny, Rossini,
Mendelssohn and Moscheles;
Anneke Scott (natural horn),
Steven Devine (Bosendorfer
grand piano c1900)
4 June: 1.05pm
Wigmore Hall
020 7935 2141,
www.wigmore-hall.org.uk
Madrigals of Carlo Gesualdo, the
Italian nobleman who turned to
composition soon after he took
part in the murder of his wife and
her lover; Collegium Vocale
Gent, Philippe Herreweghe (d)
2 June: 7.30pm
Elly Ameling shares the fruits of a
lifetime’s experience with
postgraduate students in two
masterclass sessions that focus on
repertoire from the heart of
German and French art song
3, 4 June: 10.30am
Viol consort treasures of the
17th-century; Phantasm, Laurence
Dreyfus (d, treble viol), Emilia
Benjamin (tr viol), Jonathan
Manson (ten viol), Mikko Perkola
(bass viol), Markku Luolajan-
Mikkola (viol), Elizabeth Kenny (lt)
9 June: 7.30pm
Handel’s Nine German Arias,
inspired by the popular success
of a collection of verse by the
Hamburg poet Barthold
Heinrich Brockes are performed
here by Christiane Karg and
Arcangelo, together with one of
Dietrich Buxtehude’s most
soulful sonatas
12 June: 10pm
Marin Marais Tombeau pour
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EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 50
Monsieur de Lully, Rameau,
Francoeur, Leclair; Fantasticus
19 June: 10pm
Andrew Carwood and the
Cardinall’s Musick conclude their
Fayrfax Celebration with a selection
of choral works from early Tudor
times, complete with Taverner’s
Mater Christi sanctissima and
‘Agnus Dei’ from Fayrfax’s Mass
Tecum principium
20 June: 7.30pm
This programme opens with
André Campra’s Mass Ad majorem
Dei gloriam and moves on to a
series of radiant sacred works by
Antonio Vivaldi, capped by the
so-called Red Priest’s Gloria;
Hervé Niquet, the musicians of Le
Concert Spirituel
25 June: 7.30pm
Monteverdi, Schubert, Brahms;
Monteverdi Choir, English
Baroque Soloists, John Eliot
Gardiner (d)
4 May: 7.30pm
Monteverdi’s Fifth Book of
Madrigals, complete with Hor che’l
ciel e la terra e’l vento tace, and his
radical departure from old ways
was emulated in the 1950s by
Astor Piazzolla, inventor of the
revolutionary nuevo tango, and by
María Grever, Mexico’s first
successful female composer; Julia
Zenko (voice), Hugo Ticciati (vln),
Tango for 3, Sverre Indris Joner
(piano), Per Arne Glorvigen
(bandoneon), Odd Hannisdal (vln),
Steinar Haugerud (d bass), Amstel
Quartet
3 July: 7.30pm
Monteverdi, Schoenberg; Arnold
Schoenberg Hugo Ticciati (vln),
Jennifer Stumm (vla),
Bartholomew LaFollette (cello),
Doric String Quartet, Alasdair
Beatson (piano), Alexander Oliver
(reciter)
4 July: 7.30pm
At the beginning of the 17th
century Monteverdi posed the
perennial question of every artist:
how do my creations relate to
those of past masters? How does
innovation relate to imitation?
Such questions will be put to a
panel of speakers, including
professor John Milbank, professor
Emma Dillon, Dr Simone Kotva
and Hugo Ticciati
5 July: 3pm
Monteverdi, Arvo Pärt, Tavener,
Peteris Vasks; Hugo Ticciati,
Voces8
5 July: 7.30pm
Bach’s sacred cantata Ich habe
genug is central to this programme
of music by Handel and Bach
encompassing love and destiny,
both earthbound and celestial; the
Brook Street Band, Rachel Harris, Ariane Rees (m-sop), Geoffrey
Farran Scott (vln), Nicola Blakey
(vla), Tatty Theo (cello), Carina
Cosgrave (bass), Alexandra
Bellamy (oboe), Carolyn Gibley
(hpsd, chamber org), Matthew
Brook (bass-bar)
6 July: 7.30pm
Handel, Vivaldi; Fabio Bonizzoni,
La Risonanza, Roberta Invernizzi
21 July: 7.30pm
A musical journey from Iceland to
the Mediterranean via the coasts
of Scandinavia and England;
Trio Mediæval
24 July: 10pm
HAMPSTEAD
St John’s Downshire Hill
0844 8700 887,
www.ticketsource.co.uk/
thebachplayers
Nicolas Chédeville Spring and
Summer from Les saisons
amusantes (1739), Carlo Farina
Capriccio stravagante (1627),
Giovanni Antonio Guido Spring
from Scherzi armonici sopra le
quattro staggioni dell’anno (c1725),
Gregor Joseph Werner from
Musicalischer Instrumental-Calender
(1748), Antonio Vivaldi ‘Summer’
from Le quattro stagioni (c1720);
the Bach Players
16 July: 7.30pm
STROUD GREEN
Holy Trinity Church, Granville
Road
stroudgreenfestival.org.uk
Stroud Green Festival: singing
workshop with Deborah
Roberts on the music of Byrd,
Tallis and Sheppard
14 June: 5pm
Stroud Green Festival:
Dowland lute songs; Emma
Kirkby, Gwendolen Martin (sop),
Jacob Heringman, Toby Carr (lt)
18 June: 8pm
Stroud Green Festival: ‘Climb
Every Mountain’: Music for the
Black Madonna of Montserrat;
the Telling
19 June: 8pm
Stroud Green Festival: Pergolesi
Stabat Mater, duets by Monteverdi
and Sances; Clare Norburn (sop),
Higgins (hpsd)
20 June: 7pm
Stroud Green Festival: Elicia
Silverstein (vln), John MacKean
(hpsd)
24 June: 8pm
Stroud Green Festival: music by
Purcell, Corbett, Rebel, Legrenzi
and Matteis; Spiritato!
26 June: 8pm
Stroud Green Festival:
cantatas, sonatas and songs by
Pepusch, Arne and Storace;
Clare Norburn (sop), Kaisa
Pulkkinen (rec), Geoffrey
Higgins (hpsd)
27 June: 8pm
Stroud Green Festival: songs and
dances from Europe and the New
World; K’antu Ensemble
28 June: 5.30pm
Stroud Green Festival: madrigals
by Monteverdi, Gabrieli and
Schütz; Eo Nomine
29 June: 8pm
SPITALFIELDS
Christ Church
020 7377 1362,
www.spitalfieldsmusic.org.uk
Spitalfields Summer Festival: music
from across six centuries including
works by Tomkins, Britten and
Tippett; the Sixteen, Harry
Christophers (d)
3 June: 7pm
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
Handel Israel in Egypt; La Nuova
Musica, David Bates (d)
4 June: 7.30pm
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
a programme of Compline
music ranging from simple
hymns to complex webs
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 17:52:54

of polyphony, culminating in
John Taverner’s votive
antiphon, Ave Dei patris filia;
Stile Antico
5 June: 7.30pm
Shoreditch Church
020 7377 1362,
www.spitalfieldsmusic.org.uk
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
17th-century ballads; the Carnival
Band, Vivien Ellis (voice)
11 June: 6.30pm
Spitalfields Summer Festival: arias
and concertos by Handel and
Vivaldi; La Nuova Musica,
David Bates (d), Alec Frank-
Gemmill (horn), Julia Riley (mezzo)
12 June: 7.30pm
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
explore the music of Georgian
London through music by Haydn,
Mozart, J. C. Bach and Handel;
City of London Sinfonia, Stephen
Layton (d)
16 June: 7.30pm
Village Underground
020 7377 1362,
www.spitalfieldsmusic.org.uk
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
Purcell Dido and Æneas;
Armonico Consort Elin Manahan
Thomas (sop), Rachael Lloyd
(m-sop), Robert Davies (bar),
Christopher Monks (c), William
Towers (d)
9 June: 7pm
Spitalfields Summer Festival:
Couperin ‘Leçons de ténèbres’;
La Nuova Musica
8 June: 8.30pm
SOUTH EAST
ARDINGLY
College
01904 658338, www.ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip back
to 16th-century Spain and more
specifically to Seville; the Sixteen,
Harry Christophers (d)
30 June: 7.30pm
BOUGHTON ALUPH
All Saints Church
056 0343 4123,
www.stourmusic.org.uk
www.earlymusictoday.com
EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 51
The Brook Street Band’s three-year educational project culminates with a premiere of Il Pastorale, l’Urbano e il Suburbano
Vivaldi The Four Seasons and
Concerti per il violino in tromba
marina; La Serenissima
20 June: 7.30pm
CAMBRIDGE
Great St Mary’s Church
01223 847330,
www.CambridgeEarlyMusic.org
An exploration of J. S. Bach’s
engagement with the concerto,
starting with the Suite in G minor
for violin and strings by J. B. Bach,
and ending with the Brandenburg
Concerto No.2 in F major for
trumpet, recorder, oboe and
violin, plus music by Telemann and
Muffat; the Parley of Instruments,
Philip Thorby (d)
5 August: 8pm
A concert featuring portions of
J. S. Bach’s great Mass in B minor,
and drawing on a range of other
music he composed, collected and
performed, all studied and
performed by the students during
this year’s Baroque Music
Summer School; the Parley of
Instruments, Philip Thorby (d)
8 August: 7.30pm
Little St Mary’s Church
01223 847330,
cambridgeearlymusic.org
Buxtehude, Bertali, Schmelzer,
Pandolfi, Mealli, Jenkins;
Fantasticus
21 June: 3pm
Songs of the late Renaissance and
early baroque composers who
drew much of their inspiration
from Classical literature;
Emma Kirkby (sop),
Jakob Lindberg (lt)
12 July: 3pm
listings june–august 2015
Sidney Sussex College
01223 847330,
www.CambridgeEarlyMusic.org
Music for recorder, oboe, violin
and continuo by J. S. Bach, his
friends and composers he copied
and admired; the Parley of
Instruments, Philip Thorby (d)
2 August: 4pm
Inspired by the gleeful spirit of
Carnival, Philomel uses a battery
of instruments from viols to
bagpipes (and bursts into song) to
celebrate misrule on the streets
and in the ballroom, with dances
which are sung, songs which are
played, and masquers disguised as
doctors, blind beggars and gypsies
all in search of love
9 August: 4pm
Sacred and secular music for voice
and instruments, culminating in a
powerful sequence in which
settings of Dido’s farewell to life
alternate with instrumental
ricercari by Willaert; the Intrepid
Academy
12 August: 8pm
Join a musical Grand Tour of the
city states of 16th-century Italy,
exploring the unparalleled riches
of their courts and chapels;
students of the Renaissance
Summer School, members of
Philomel, the Intrepid Academy
14 August: 7.30pm
Trinity College
01223 847330,
cambridgeearlymusic.org
A programme of Compline music
ranging from simple hymns to
complex webs of polyphony,
culminating in John Taverner’s
votive antiphon, Ave Dei patris filia;
june–august 2015 earlymusictoday
Stile Antico
15 August: 7.30pm
West Road Concert Hall
01223 335184, www.westroad.org
Mozart Overture to Lucio Silla
(1772), Concerto No.5 in D
major (early version for organ,
1773), Mozart arr Levin Allegro
to a keyboard concerto in G
major, Symphony No.29 in A
major (1774), J. C. Bach arr.
Mozart Harpsichord concerto in
D major K107/1 (1772);
Academy of Ancient Music, Pavlo
Beznosiuk (d, vln), Robert Levin
(d, vln, org)
6 July: 7.30pm
CROYDON
Minster
01904 658338, ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip back
to 16th-century Spain and more
specifically to Seville; the Sixteen
10 June: 7.30pm
HITCHIN
Benslow Music Trust
01462 459446, www.benslow.org
Baroque string orchestra; Theresa
Caudle (vln), Mark Caudle (cello)
and Alastair Ross (hpsd) once
again lead this course
8–11 June
The International Viol Summer
School; Alison Crum, Abi Aziz,
Roy Marks, Peter Wendland
(leaders)
12–17 July
Baroque on modern instruments;
Lucy Russell, Gail Hennessey, Nick
Parle, Peter McCarthy (leaders)
17–20 August
51
18/05/2015 12:39:02
 listings june–august 2015
Madrigal and Part Song Summer
School; Simon Wallfisch (tutor)
17–20 August
KENT
All Saints’ Church, Boughton
Aluph
05603 434123,
www.stourmusic.org.uk
Music in Shakespeare’s London;
the City Musick
19 June: 10pm
Vivaldi Concertos; La Serenissima,
Adrian Chandler (d, vln), Peter
Whelan (bassoon)
20 June: 7.30pm
Palestrina, first performance of
newly discovered work; the
Victoria Consort
20 June: 10pm
Nine Daies Wonder,
Shakespearean actor Will
Kempe’s dancing and singing
journey from London to
Norwich; the Society of Strange
& Ancient Instruments, Steven
Player (dancer), Clare Salaman
(nyckelharpa, hurdy-gurdy),
Jeremy Avis (percussion,
cittern), Alison McGillivray
(viola bastarda, violone), Ian
Harrison (percussion, pipe, tabor,
cornet, pipes, whistle)
21 June: 3pm
Carissimi’s Jephte, Charpentier;
Vox Luminis, Lionel Meunier (d)
26 June: 7.30pm
Purcell and John Blow duets;
Michael Chance (c-ten) and
Alexander Chance (c-ten), Laszlo
Rozsa and Oonagh Lee
(recorders), Lucia Capellaro (bar
cello), Maggie Cole (hpsd)
26 June: 10pm
Vivaldi, Locatelli, Biber and
Vejvanovsky; Academy of Ancient
Music, Bojan Čičić (d, vln)
27 June: 7.30pm
J. S. Bach French Overture, Italian
Concerto; Steven Devine (hpsd)
27 June: 10pm
Handel Athalia; Lynne Dawson
(sop), Kathryn Jenkin (sop),
Michael Chance (c-ten),
Charles Daniels (ten), David
Stout (bar), Stour Festival Choir
& Orchestra, Mark Deller (d)
28 June: 3pm
52 earlymusictoday june–august 2015
EMTJJA15_046-052_R_Listings.indd 52
KINGS LYNN
Minster
01553 764864,
kingslynnfestival.org.uk,
Baroque concertos inspired by
saints and angels: Vejvanofsky,
Vivaldi, Leclair, Locatelli, Biber;
Academy of Ancient Music, Bojan
Čičić (d, vln)
18 July: 7pm
LEWES
Glyndebourne
01273 813813, Glyndebourne.com
Handel’s Saul; Orchestra of the
Age of Enlightenment, Ivor Bolton
(d), Christopher Purves, Iestyn
Davies, Lucy Crowe, Paul Appleby
23, 29 July, 1, 6, 12, 15, 17, 20,
22, 25, 27, 29 August: 5.20pm
26 July: 4.05pm
MANNINGTREE
Methodist Church
www.annekescott.com/songsoflove
Schubert, Gallay, Czerny, Rossini,
Mendelssohn and Moscheles;
Anneke Scott (natural horn),
Steven Devine (Broadwood
grand piano c1830)
5 June: 7.30pm
NORWICH
The Octagon Chapel
0844 8700 887,
www.ticketsource.co.uk/
thebachplayers
Nicolas Chédeville: Spring and
Summer from Les saisons
amusantes (1739), Carlo Farina
Capriccio stravagante (1627),
Giovanni Antonio Guido ‘Spring’
from Scherzi armonici sopra le
quattro staggioni dell’anno
(c1725), Gregor Joseph Werner
from Musicalischer Instrumental-
Calender (1748), Antonio Vivaldi
‘Summer’ from Le quattro stagioni
(c1720); the Bach Players
16 July: 7.30pm
OXFORD
Exeter College Chapel
01865 279 600,
www.exeter.ox.ac.uk
A musical Grand Tour of the
major royal courts of Europe,
featuring music by Bach,
Couperin, Telemann,
Handel, Vivaldi and Zelenka;
Charivari Agréable, Sarah Ibbett,
Anne Marie Christensen (vln),
Jane Downer (rec, oboe),
Michael Brain (bassoon),
Kah-Ming Ng (hpsd)
6 & 23 July; 12 August: 8pm
Handel, Chandos Anthems,
Concerto Grosso 2 for oboe and
strings and more; Charivari
Agréable Simfonie, Kah-Ming Ng
(chamber org)
8 July; 1, 17 August: 8pm
Bach, Barrière, Boccherini,
Galeoti, Vivaldi; Chariari
Agréable, Jonathan Rees, Vlimir
Waltham, (cello), Kah-Ming Ng
(hpsd)
11, 29 July: 8pm
Songs and instrumental pieces
from the golden age of England
and Spain, including Dowland,
Lawes, Morley, Simpson; Chariari
Agréable, Isobel Collyer (reader,
sop), Layil Barr (bass viol, recs),
Kah-Ming Ng (virginals)
15, 27 July, 6, 15 August: 8pm
An A-Z of rare opera overtures
from early baroque Italy;
Charivari Agréable
15, 25 July, 8 August: 8pm
Sensuous arias, cantatas, and
motets for alto, oboe d’amore
and orchestra; Charivari
Agréable, Roderick Morris
(c-ten), Kah-Ming Ng
(d, chamber org)
18, 30 July, 10 August: 8pm
Bach, Mattheson, Handel,
Buxtehude; Kah-Ming Ng (hpsd)
20 July, 5, 13 August
PETERBOROUGH
Cathedral
01904 658338, ncem.co.uk
Flight of Angels: music by
Guerrero and Lobo – a trip back
to 16th-century Spain and more
specifically to Seville; the Sixteen,
Harry Christophers (d)
12 June: 7.30pm
THORPE BAY
St Augustine’s Church
www.annekescott.com/songsoflove
Schubert, Gallay, Czerny,
Rossini, Mendelssohn and
Moscheles; Anneke Scott
(natural horn), Steven Devine
(Pleyel grand piano c1900)
3 June: 7pm
SOUTH WEST
NEWTON ABBOT
St Michael’s Church, Chagford
01647 432265,
chagfordchurch.com
Songs and instrumental pieces
from the golden age of England
and Spain, incuding Dowland,
Lawes, Morley, Simpson;
Charivari Agréable, Isobel
Collyer (reader, sop),
Layil Barr (bass viol, recs), Kah-
Ming Ng (virginals)
21 June: 7.30pm
SALISBURY
Cathedral
0845 241 9651,
salisburyfestival.co.uk
A programme showcasing the
plight of the Catholics in
Elizabethan England, often
expressed through metaphors
about the Israelites in exile.
Music by Tallis, Byrd, White, van
Wilder; Stile Antico
6 June: 7.30pm
SNAPE
SNAPE MALTINGS
01728 687110, aldeburgh.co.uk
A three-year educational project
in London and Suffolk culminates
in the premiere of the Handel-
inspired Il Pastorale, l’Urbano e il
Suburbano, with music by
Matthew King and libretto by
Alasdair Middleton. 150 primary
school children join a London
community orchestra, a Suffolk
community choir, a parents’
choir, and the Brook Street Band.
10 July: 5pm
The deadline for supplying
information for the listings section
in the September–November 2015
issue is 20 July 2015.
Please send brief details to:
Boston Wheatley, Early Music Today
Rhinegold House, 20 Rugby Street,
London WC1N 3QZ
Email: emt@rhinegold.co.uk
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 17:54:40

JUNE-AUGUST 2015 Volume 23 No. 3
WWW.EARLYMUSICTODAY.COM
£4.95
BROADSIDE BALLADS
The Carnival Band records the
hits of the 17th century
IN HANDEL’S SHADOW
Julian Perkins investigates the
music of John Christopher Smith
STILE ANTICO
The British ensemble celebrates
ten years of success
PLUS even more NEWS, COMMENT, REVIEWS and the DEFINITIVE GUIDE to what’s on in the early music world
EMTJJA15_001_Cover.indd 1-2
NEWS
LONDON FESTIVAL OF BAROQUE
MUSIC INAUGURATED
CATHERINE PEILLON
MARCO BORGGREVE
(clockwise from top left) Festival director Lindsay Kemp; featuring in the 2015 festival:
María Cristina Kiehr, Kati Debretzeni and Bach Collegium Japan
When the German airline Lufthansa
announced that, after 2014, it would cease
to sponsor the annual London baroque
music festival that bore its name, many
feared that the demise of the festival itself
would follow suit. Happily, it has been
born again and rebranded simply as the
London Festival of Baroque Music, and its
first season takes place in May.
Thanks to the hard work of Lindsay
Kemp, who has overseen the transition
and who continues in his role as artistic
director, the festival’s usual high standard
6 March–May 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com
EMT_0215_R_News_6-11.indd 6
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must be quoted to receive discount. Overseas orders are
welcome, but are subject to a supplementary postage charge.
See online for details. Subscriptions can also be ordered over
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the EMT app, selected retail outlets and
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of programming has been maintained: the
season is dedicated to celebrating women
in baroque music, and performers include
soprano Hana Blažiková with Bach
Collegium Japan, Carolyn Sampson with
Ex Cathedra, and María Cristina Kiehr
with Concerto Soave. The Bach Players
explore the music of Elisabeth Jacquet de
La Guerre, while Kati Debretzeni directs
the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
in a concert of works written by Vivaldi
for the Pietà in Venice.
www.lfbm.org.uk
NEW PERSONNEL
APPOINTMENTS
AT THE OAE
The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment
has appointed Crispin Woodhead as its
new chief executive. He joined from the
ensemble Arcangelo, where he was general
manager; prior to this, he was a fellow in
keyboard studies at the Royal Northern
College of Music and founder of Phoenix
Arts Management.
Woodhead said of his appointment: ‘I
am thrilled to be joining the outstanding
Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.
This period orchestra has a challengingly
broad repertoire as they constantly seek
to innovate and break new ground. I am
joining at a pivotal stage in the OAE’s
history, as it celebrates 30 years of breaking
the rules and I can’t wait to become a part
of their extraordinary story.’
The orchestra has also appointed a
new principal viola. Canadian violist
Max Mandel comes from a mainly
chamber music background; he
commented that ‘when a position in a
ground-breaking group like the OAE
comes up, you just have to go for it. I’m
always looking for new challenges’.
www.oae.co.uk
BOSTON BAROQUE
LAUNCHES NEW
ELECTRONIC MEDIA
PLATFORM
Fresh from celebrating its 40th anniversary,
leading American ensemble Boston
Baroque has unveiled a new digital
initiative. Boston Baroque Radio launched
late last year, and is a 24-hour internet
station playing recordings from the
orchestra’s catalogue; in addition, it will live
stream each concert for free in both audio
and video. Boston Baroque has also signed
an agreement with Naxos of America to
provide digital downloads of these live
concerts, although it will continue to record
in the studio with Linn Records.
www.bostonbaroque.org
12/02/2015 17:43:22
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REVIEWS
Music, morals
and money
THE BEST OF THE LATEST CDS AND BOOKS IN EARLY MUSIC
RHINEGOLD aSTORE
CDs and books featured in this issue are available to purchase via Rhinegold’s aStore. We have endeavoured to include all of the issue’s
review items into one handy store, meaning you don’t have to spend time searching for the products you want. Visit www.rhinegold.co.uk/astore
and look for ‘Early Music Today: March–May 2015’.
Brian Robins considers the role of music and ethics in finance, exploring FABIO BONIZZONI’s
Treasures of the Empfindsamkeit – sumptuous instrument (a 1784 Hoffmann from the Cobbe
brave new initiative
C. P. E. Bach, Müthel, Haydn, Mozart Collection at Hatchlands Park) and masterpieces on offer, it
F
Carole Cerasi (clvd) is the artist here who deserves the most credit. In her
• 1 year/4 issues: £14.85 (quote EJA15)
MET CD 1091 extremely capable hands, the music is transformed into abio Bonizzoni, organist and of ethical finance,’ Bonizzoni explains. ‘Music in venues of power’, given in
 finely carved works of art, nowhere more so than Bach’s director of La Risonanza, is ‘The idea is not only to remember harness with a harpsichord recital by
F sharp minor Fantasie Wq 67. This self-portrait of the likely to be best known among Chiara, but – equally important – to Bonizzoni devoted to music at the
composer in old age is so beautifully crafted, with every early music enthusiasts for his remember her contribution to the French court, and, significantly,
Composers writing in the empfindsamer Stil or ‘sensitive nuance and colour plunging the listener into an array of near-flawless and lavishly praised series debate, and to continue what she had to ‘Patronage for the arts’, which preceded
style’ (mainly from 18th-century north Germany) believed ever-changing emotions, that it’s almost a relief to hear the of Handel’s chamber cantatas on Glossa. leave unfinished. She felt a strong a programme of chamber works by
‘in the need for convincing, sensitive personal expression at last chord and be released from the music’s intensity. But Bonizzoni is also a man with a commitment to those themes and we Handel given by soprano Yetzabel Arias
the keyboard’; C. P. E. Bach pleaded for musicians to ‘play After a major-key lift in the middle movement of Bach’s mission. In 2012 his wife Chiara want to take them over, but using music Fernandez and La Risonanza.
from the soul’. Carole Cerasi’s selection of works includes Sonata in E minor Wq 52/6, the last movement is Manzoni, a highly respected financial – our medium. This is definitely The general concept of a more ethical
some of the most deeply felt musical utterances ever enshrouded in tense, nervous anxiety, while every last drop journalist, died prematurely; as a tribute, something I want to pursue further. Not approach to global finance and banking
composed during this time. C. P. E. Bach of course, is well is squeezed out of Mozart’s B minor Adagio KV540. Bonizzoni decided to mount a series of only an ethical approach in the finance was given momentum in the wake of the
represented, but there are offerings too from his great Haydn’s C minor Sonata Hob XIV/ 20 is suitably restless concerts in Milan in association with world, but in corporate business, financial crisis of 2008. International
friend Johann Gottfried Müthel (1728–1788), as well as and turbulent. Cerasi is a master of her art. KM lectures by noted figures in the academic trading, energy. The core will remain banks and bankers found themselves
other enthusiasts of Bach – Haydn and Mozart. and financial world devoted to the financial, but every year we will also under intense scrutiny and the subject of
Cerasi’s performance on that ‘lonely, melancholy, WIN A COPY! topic ‘Notes on Ethics in Finance to devote events to talk about ethics in the widespread opprobrium. The notion that
inexpressibly sweet instrument’, the clavichord, intensifies EARLY MUSIC TODAY has five copies of ‘Treasures of the Empfindsamkeit’ to give Enrich Society’. other fields in the world today. We aim global financial activity had a social
away. To win a copy, send a postcard to ‘Disc of the Month – March 15’, Early
the listening experience on this truly inspiring disc, I met Bonizzoni following a to increase knowledge and responsibility beyond wealth creation
• 2 year/8 issues: £29.70 (quote EJA15B)
bringing intimacy as only the clavichord can. Yet for all the
Music Today, Rhinegold Publishing, 20 Rugby Street, London WC1N 3QZ.
 performance of Purcell’s Dido and Æneas
in the Concertgebouw of Bruges in
consciousness rather than raise money’.
Notwithstanding such a didactic
led directly to the setting up of a
commission under the auspices of the
November, an event following a staging objective, the lectures presented under UK’s presidency of the G8. The report,
CDs of the same opera dedicated to Chiara at Bonizzoni’s auspices in Milan during Impact Investment: The Invisible Heart of
Milan’s Stock Exchange. ‘My wife and I autumn 2014 suggest a rather broader Markets, was published in the autumn of
Mozart: Requiem Antoinette, had tried unsuccessfully to A Spagna in the Works held many conversations on the subject prospectus, including topics such as 2014. Crucially, in what its introduction
Accentus, Laurence escape from house arrest in revolutionary Alison Crum (viols), describes as ‘a paradigm shift in capital
EugEnio Marongiu
Equilbey (d) Paris with the rest of the French royal Roy Marks (lute, guitar) market thinking’, the report recognises
Naïve V 5370 family. Before the French Revolution, her Alison Crum ORS087 that rather than investment involving
 opulently luxurious residence was at the  two traditional key elements, risk and
Palace of Versailles, where she would have return, a third should also be
In July 1791 Mozart received an frequently attended mass at the Chapelle This delightful new recording by Alison considered: impact investment – the
anonymous commission to write a requiem Royale. In February 2014, that very same Crum and Roy Marks presents 38 short social and ethical implications of
mass. Though he had contacted Mozart Chapelle was the venue for Laurence pieces for string instruments from the 15th investment. Or as Bonizzoni graphically
through an intermediary, the Austrian Equilbey and the Insula Orchestra’s recent and 16th centuries. The CD’s light-hearted put it to me: ‘I’d like more people to be
Count Franz von Walsegg wished the recording of the Mozart Requiem. title takes its name from one of the cantus aware that with a certain type of
requiem to be a monument to the memory Equilbey’s tempi have an un-indulgent firmi or tenors – La Spagna – upon which investment we might earn 0.5% more in
• 3 year/12 issues: £44.55 (quote EJA15C)
of his late wife, Anna. The same month discipline that maintains the velocity of composer-performers wove complex a year, but that it could eventually
Mozart had received another commission the faster movements to exciting effect. counterpoint and improvised divisions; it destroy the planet.’
to compose the opera La clemenza di Tito for The chamber choir Accentus should be features here in ten different settings. In While the report makes no specific
Holy Roman Emperor Leopold II’s better known outside France: their sound addition to the dance-like recercadas of mention of the arts (perhaps that would
coronation as King of Bohemia in Prague. is vibrant and fresh. This recording’s team Diego Ortiz and Sylvestro di Ganassi and be too much to expect!), the implications
A few weeks before Mozart received of soloists is very well balanced, the ‘wistfully rhapsodic’ catches of Henry for the arts world should be evident.
these two major commissions, Leopold II’s underpinned ably by Christopher Purves’ VIII, arrangements of madrigals and free- They certainly were to Arts Council
Milan’s Stock Exchange hosted a staging of Dido and Æeneas
aunt, the Queen of France Marie velvety bass-baritone. NB flowing pieces provide music whose England’s chairman Sir Peter Bazalgette,
36 March–May 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com 26 March–May 2015 www.earlymusictoday.com
EMT_0215_R_Reviews_36-48.indd 36 16/02/2015 11:03:18 EMT_0215_F_Feature 1 Fabio Bonizzoni_26-29.indd 26 12/02/2015 15:30:56
ORDER NOW BY VISITING
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In the September–
November issue:
• The Society of Strange and
Ancient Instruments explores
Francis Bacon’s musical
philosophies
• EMT revisits Gothic Voices’
bestselling ‘A Feather on the
Breath of God’, 30 years after
its release
• The Sun King and his music –
Louis XIV on the BBC
53BALDWIN
JUNE–AUGUST 2015 EARLYMUSICTODAYPATRICK
14/05/2015 18:01:21
 BACKSTORY
Q&A – Paul McCreesh
Paul McCreesh founded the Gabrieli
Consort & Players in 1982; together they
have won numerous awards for their
performances and recordings. After
recent releases of 19th- and 20th-century
choral music on their own label Winged
Lion, this summer they will perform
Purcell’s King Arthur for the first time in
nearly 15 years.
KING ARTHUR WAS WRITTEN
AS INCIDENTAL MUSIC
FOR A TEXT BY DRYDEN,
BUT IN YOUR UPCOMING
CONCERTS YOU’LL JUST BE
PERFORMING THE MUSIC.
WHAT CHALLENGES DOES
THIS PRESENT?
It’s the same problem as with The Fairy
Queen, Purcell’s other major semi-opera
– they’re structurally so difficult to put
together, but the music is so wonderful.
I dream one day of performing them
properly with actors, singers and
dancers, but the reality is that I’d need to
be a multimillionaire, which isn’t going
to happen … In a way, the beauty of
semi-opera from the point of view of
concert performances is that, effectively,
the music is arranged into a series of
self-contained masques, so you don’t
particularly miss the full story.
DRYDEN WAS INFLUENCED
BY THE POLITICAL SITUATION
OF THE TIME, WHEN VARIOUS
FACTIONS WERE JOSTLING
FOR THE BRITISH THRONE;
HOW MUCH DOES THAT COME
TO BEAR ON THE MUSIC?
Every single work of art, to some degree,
reflects the zeitgeist, the moment of its
conception, and of course it’s fascinating
– but in the end, the music stands for
itself. In a way it’s really a piece about
nostalgia for the perfect life, a life of
quiet and repose. And, in a sense, isn’t
all art about that? It’s that argument
about how far you submit yourself to the
spiritual as opposed to the temporal.
54 EARLYMUSICTODAY JUNE–AUGUST 2015
EMTJJA15_054_R_Backstory.indd 54
PURCELL HAS A REAL GIFT
BEN WRIGHT
FOR MUSIC OF SPIRITS AND
MAGIC, AND KING ARTHUR
IS FULL OF THIS. WHAT IS IT
THAT IS SO ENTRANCING
AND SEDUCTIVE ABOUT HIS
MUSIC?
I think it comes from two things. He
creates in supernatural characters, if
you like, heightened human emotions,
which is why he also writes such great
love music. And the reason I think he
writes great love music is that there is
no other composer who is so
extraordinarily attuned to the beauty of
poetry of the English language – Purcell
could set the telephone directory to
music and still make it interesting! It’s
also because he has an extraordinarily
deft sense of harmonic language. He
has this ability to notate what are often
quite complex lines so that there’s an
almost jazz-like rubato between bass
and voice. He pushes emotions through
this subtle, manipulative use of
harmony, and particularly in writing
vocal lines which glide in a very
seductive way around the bass.
YOU SPEND A LOT OF YOUR
TIME NOW WORKING WITH
SYMPHONY ORCHESTRAS;
DO YOU MISS THE EARLIER
REPERTOIRE?
At the risk of sounding like an old man, down that road, it’s a great lesson for
I’m sometimes not totally happy with any type of music you do, because you
how the early music movement’s going. have this intellectual curiosity which I
It seems to be more and more laissez- think is the root of all interpretation. It’s
faire, more and more sloppy – I don’t not just about feeling the music: it’s
mean that scholarship is the aim of the about engaging the brain and then
game, but it’s where you have to start. allowing yourself to feel it, and I think
A lot of the things that seem to be this is quite important.
becoming de rigueur appear to come
from world music, and I feel that certain Paul McCreesh and the Gabrieli Consort &
groups, in the constant desire for Players perform Purcell’s King Arthur at
novelty, are not really serious about how St John’s Smith Square, London, on 16 July,
this music should sound. I just want to and in France and Germany;
be tougher – it’s not embarrassing to www.gabrieli.com, www.sjss.org.uk.
think about the academic side of early
music, or of any music. Once you go ADRIAN HORSEWOOD
www.earlymusictoday.com
14/05/2015 10:16:20
 JEFFREY THOMAS
music director

VERSAILLES & THE PARISIAN BAROQUE

Marin Marais: Sémélé
First complete performance outside of Europe

Rebel: Les élémens ~ Rameau: Overture and Suite from Naïs

Additional works by Boismortier, Clarke, Corelli, Couperin,
Fantini, Handel, Purcell, Scarlatti, Uccellini, and others
Johann Sebastian Bach: Mass in B Minor

American Bach Soloists Academy

an advanced training program for emerging professionals
and accomplished students of Historically Informed Performance Practice
Elizabeth Blumenstock, violin & viola Debra Nagy, oboe & recorder
Max van Egmond, voice William Sharp, voice
Corey Jamason, harpsichord & co-director William Skeen, violoncello
Steven Lehning, violone & contrabass Kenneth Slowik, violoncello & viola da gamba
Judith Malafronte, voice Dominic Teresi, bassoon
Robert Mealy, violin & viola John Thiessen, trumpet
Sandra Miller, flute Jeffrey Thomas, conductor & co-director

americanbach.org
Strings_Summer_15.indd 12 10/04/2015 10:51:28