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Alexander Weimann Inaugurates EMV’s Graf Piano with Mozart, Schubert & Beethoven | DCH

Wednesday October 27, 2021 | 7:30 pm

EMV highlights Alexander Weimann, one of the most sought-after ensemble directors, soloists, keyboardists and chamber music partners of his generation, as he inaugurates the newest acquisition of our instrument collection: a fortepiano modelled on an 1819 instrument by Conrad Graf (1782-1851), built by the world-famous Paul McNulty. Graf did much of his most important work during the short life of Franz Schubert, and although he rose to prominence after Mozart and Haydn had died, he was continuing the tradition of Viennese fortepianos with which they were familiar.

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Lab’rinths: Purcell & his Contemporaries | EMV DCH

Wednesday November 10, 2021 | 7:30PM
Online

The program name ‘Lab’rinths’ evokes the spiritual mystery and human turmoil captured so clearly by Purcell and his contemporaries. Taken from a collection of sacred songs published in 1688 by Henry Playford, ‘Harmonia Sacra’, these devotional songs by Purcell can often be interpreted as biblical ‘mad scenes’: they offer the listener a glimpse into his most dramatic and harmonically adventurous explorations of personal loss, confusion, spiritual angst and delirious ecstasy. These songs will be sung by baritone Jonathon Adams and accompanied by Mélisande Corriveau on viola da gamba and Eric Milnes on organ and harpsichord. Interpolating these vivid scenes are pieces written for two viols by contemporaries of Purcell. Susie Napper will join Corriveau and Milnes for these instrumental selections.

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Bach’s Sons feat. Elinor Frey, cello & Pacific Baroque Orchestra | EMV DCH

Wednesday, November 24, 2021 | 7:30PM
Online

Of J.S. Bach’s children that survived into adulthood, four became composers whose music we still perform. While their musical facility reflects their father’s influence, each son had a very different path of travel, employment, and development of their musical voice. Johann Christian’s Chromatic Fugue on B-A-C-H pays homage to the serious, contrapuntal style of the past, but usually the Bach sons write in the galant style of their own generation, characterized by simplicity and immediacy of appeal. The closeness of the Bachs sometimes complicates the attribution of their music. The Orchestral Suite in G minor, BWV 1070, once thought to be by father Johann Sebastian, was more likely written by Wilhelm Friedemann. The Cello Sonata in A Major of Johann Christoph Friedrich seems liberated, natural, and comprehensible when played on a cello fit with a fifth string whereas the Cello Concerto in A minor of his older brother, Carl Philipp Emanuel fits well on the more popular 4-string instrument. Each work demonstrates the language of Sensibility (Empfindsamkeit): intimate, sensitive, and subjective. In their music, emotions are fleeting and instantaneous and, above all, the beauty of melody is emphasized.

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Clair-Obscur: Corsican Polyphony feat. Constantinople & A Filetta

Friday, December 3, 2021 | 7:30 pm
Pacific Spirit United Church (formerly Ryerson Church)

Constantinople partners with the seminal Corsican polyphonic singing group A Filetta, to create an enchanting sonic tableau where light and shadow meet, through sacred and secular songs from the rich Corsican musical tradition. Polyphony by the prodigious vocalists of A Filetta, as well as songs and music orchestrated by Kiya Tabassian, will come together in a deeply moving concert.

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Festive Cantatas: Bach’s Christmas Oratorio feat. Pacific Baroque Orchestra

Thursday, December 16, 2021 | 7:30PM
Chan Centre for the Performing Arts

This year, EMV’s Festive Cantatas features some of the most popular Christmas music of Germany in the 18th century by Johann Kuhanu and J.S. Bach. Kuhnau was cantor in the Thomaskirche of Leipzig before Bach and in addition to being a remarkable composer, he was a lawyer and a linguist who wrote a satirical novel, Der musicalische Quacksalber (1700). Only recently has Kuhnau’s church music been given a bit of the attention it deserves. Kuhnau’s cantata « Wie Schön leuchtet der Morgenstern » (How brightly shines the morning star) is filled with moments of lyric beauty and expertly-rendered Italianate ritornelli echoed in the solo vocal lines. The quality of this work is an excellent argument for exploring more deeply the musical culture that preceded and influenced J.S. Bach. This cantata contains some of the earliest orchestral writing for natural horns and this may have inspired Bach to do the same in his cantata by the same name as well as in Cantata V of the Christmas Oratorio. The Christmas Oratorio was originally written as six cantatas for six different days between Christmas and the feast of Epiphany.

For this performance of Cantatas IV and V from the Christmas Oratorio, five Canadian soloists of international renown join the musicians of the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, under the direction of Alexander Weimann.

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