Past Events

Today, the five-string cello is treated as an exotic and rarely-played cousin of the standard cello. However, in the 17th and 18th centuries it was simply one of the many instruments used in the family of bass violins and was particularly important for virtuosc sonatas and solos. This programme centres around the five-string cello’s most enduring work, Bach’s Sixth Solo Cello Suite (BWV 1012).

Each movement reveals the instrument’s incredible versatility and remarkable colours. Elinor Frey explores these qualities further through two newer works, “Guided By Voices” by Scott Godin (based on “O Vis Aeternitatis” of Hildegard von Bingen) and “With concord of sweet sounds” by Isaiah Ceccarelli.

Chiara Margarita Cozzolani has been steadily receiving recognition in recent decades as one of the most skillful and expressive of a handful of published nun composers from seventeenth-century Italy. She took her vows at age 18, adopting “Chiara” as her religious name as she entered the Benedictine monastery of Santa Radegonda, where she would serve as maestra di cappella, abbess, and prioress.

This programme focuses on her 1648 collection of twelve motets for solo soprano, Scherzi di sacra melodia. No copy of the accompanying basso continuo partbook has been found, making the collection inaccessible to performers until now. The bass part for three of the motets was composed from scratch by lutenist Lucas Harris. The concert ends with Non tema nò di morte, a trio from the sole surviving collection of another Italian nun composer, Maria Francesca Nascinbeni. Of Nascinbeni’s life we know little, though in her publication’s preface she casually mentions being only sixteen years old.

This concert showcases the music of 18th-century female composers who, though forgotten or ignored by history, in their day shared the stage with and enjoyed the respect and friendship of...

The works selected by Mélisande Corriveau and Eric Milnes for this evening present a vibrant array of French musical styles developed during the 18th century before the French Revolution. The origin and development of the pardessus de viole – known in France as “the woman’s violin”- coincided with the increasing prominence of the violin in French instrumental fashion. The crowning glory of the viola da gamba family, the pardessus – the smallest of the viola da gamba family of instruments – facilitated the instrument’s rise in popularity in France. Most of the works which will be performed were selected from the microfilm collections of the Bibliothèque Nationale de France, and few had been recorded until Mélisande’s recent recording. They are charming, playful, luminous and exquisitely elegant.