Early Music Vancouver Events

The Other Seasons

Friday, September 30, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Ensemble Castor; Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt, violin and direction; Hélène Brunet, soprano

A fun alternative to Vivaldi’s Four Seasons, this concert pairs concertos for Ensemble Castor’s six musicians with arias and motets by the Venetian ‘Red Priest.’ We welcome the wonderful soprano Hélène Brunet who will unleash her dramatic abilities and virtuosic roulades through arias filled with nature characterizations such as birdsongs, tempests, hunts and pastoral life. Vivaldi uses themes from his Four Seasons in several of his vocal arias and ‘Gelido in ogni vena’ echoes the theme of the first movement of his famed Winter concerto.

“These players never fail to find something to say … lovely, imaginative performances on some sweet-sounding instruments!” – Gramophone, August 2017

Ensemble Castor: 
Rodolfo Richter, solo violin
Petra Samhaber-Eckhardt and Nina Pohn, violins
Peter Aigner, viola
Kristina Chalmovska, cello
Barbara Fischer, double-bass
Erich Traxler, harpsichord

This concert is generously supported by Simon Murphy.

On the Breath of Angels

Friday, March 3, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Hana Blažíková, soprano; Bruce Dickey, cornetto; the Breathtaking Collective

During the height of its popularity, from the mid-16th century into the 18th, the cornetto was frequently depicted in art as an instrument of angels. Paintings, sculptures, and engravings abound in which the cornetto takes a prominent place among the choirs of angelic musicians. The connection with angels in this program serves as a point of departure for an aural journey that ranges from 1600 to the present day, exploring the ways in which the cornetto and the human voice can interact, imitate each other, and entwine musically.

Works by illustrious 17th century composers Francesco Cavalli and Giacomo Carissimi will be heard next to pieces from a recently discovered manuscript from around 1600 that turned up recently in an auction and then promptly disappeared again after the sale. Two new works by Ivan Moody and Julian Wachner will explore both the instrumental-vocal duality and the theme of angels. These worlds will be bridged with a wonderful chanson of Erik Satie called Les Anges. This concert is sure to bring us closer to angelic realms.

The Birds Concert

Friday, April 21, 2023 | 7:30 p.m. Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: La Rêveuse – Florence Bolton, direction and viola da gamba; Benjamin Perrot, direction and theorbo; Clément Geoffroy, harpsichord; Sébastien Marq, recorder

Bird song is very different from the sound of instruments, but no other animal has given such inspiration to musicians and composers, from the Middle Ages to the 21st century. Through fascination for birdsong this programme brings to life a certain vision of the music of the 17th and 18th centuries focusing on science, nature and culture, illustrated with arrangements for early instruments of some essential pieces of the twentieth century inspired by Couperin, Rameau and Corrette. 

La Rêveuse is an ensemble of solo musicians that works on the heritage of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, a period rich in artistic experiments and inventions of all kinds.

This concert is generously supported by Anthony Morgan.

Crossing the Andes

Friday, May 26, 2023 | 7:30 p.m. Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Constantinople directed by Kiya Tabassian; Federico Tarrazona, charango; Jonatan Alvarado, voice and guitar

This concert explores the juxtaposition of indigenous South American musical traditions with the ‘new’ repertoire introduced by the European colonizers in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. The two main sources used to explore this repertoire are The Trujillo Codex from Peru and the Codice Luz y Norte published in Madrid but written in Mexico. The charango and pan flutes featured in this concert are played by virtuoso Federico Tarazone from Peru. The charango is a small guitar with five double strings that looks like a Spanish bandurria and is one of the most popular Andean musical instruments. Its resonator, which is rounded, is made from the shell of an armadillo. It has many names and is also known as tatú, atatou, quirquincho, querú, cabasu, piche, mulita, toche, mataca. The Argentinian singer Jonatan Alvarado, specialist of South American repertoire whose passion is to revive the tradition of self-accompanied singing, will join the ensemble to recreate this colourful journey.

This concert is generously supported by Fran Watters & Paul Devine.

The Odyssey of Kryštof Harant

Thursday, December 1, 2022 | 7:30 p.m. Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Ensemble Cappella Mariana, Constantinople directed by Kiya Tabassian, and narrator Bill Richardson

The life journey of the Czech nobleman, traveller, humanist, soldier, writer and composer Kryštof Harant from Polžice and Bezdružice ended prematurely on the Old Town Square in Prague on June 21, 1621, when he was executed for participating in the Protestant Bohemian Revolt. The goal of this project of Ensemble Cappella Mariana is to present his surviving compositions and introduce listeners to his literary legacy – his record of a unique trip to the Middle East which he chronicled in his book Journey from Bohemia to the Holy Land, by way of Venice and the Sea published in 1608.

Harant’s colourful work, narrated by Bill Richardson, will guide you on a musical journey to the exotic lands of Cyprus, Jerusalem, Sinai, and Cairo, where, in addition to Harant’s compositions, we will also hear the music of distant lands as he himself heard them.

This concert is generously supported by Marianne Gibson & Delma Hemming. 

Consone Quartet: BBC New Generation Artists

Friday, February 17, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Consone Quartet – Agata Daraškaite, and Magdalena Loth-Hill, violins; Elitsa Bogdanova, viola; George Ross, cello

London’s Consone Quartet is the first period instrument quartet to be selected as ‘BBC New Generation Artists.’ Praised for their honest and expressive playing; they are fast making a name for themselves in classical and early romantic repertoire. This programme presents works by Mozart, Haydn, the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, and Fanny Mendelssohn.

“…instantly leaps out of the stereo at you as something special” (The Strad, 2019)

This concert is generously supported by Sharon Kahn and Barrie MacFadden.

Raise, raise the voice

Friday, February 3, 2023 | 7:30 p.m.

Note: This concert is part of both the Cathedral Subscription Series and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra Subscription Series

Artists: Reginald Mobley, countertenor; the Pacific Baroque Orchestra directed by Alexander Weimann 

Reginald Mobley returns to Vancouver to share his incomparable artistry with Alexander Weimann and the Pacific Baroque Orchestra in a unique recital. Reggie’s strong devotion to social and political activism has helped him focus on a desire to make a
difference within the arts, particularly with the massive inequality regarding race, gender, and sexuality within the classical music industry.

‘Raise, raise the voice’, one of Henry Purcell’s most attractive smaller-scale works, praises Apollo on ‘sacred Music’s holy day.’ This title also serves to remind us of the importance of raising all the artistic voices of our rich and diverse world. 

The Art of the Lute with Thomas Dunford

Friday, November 25, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Thomas Dunford, lute

The lute arrived in Europe from Moorish Spain, spreading rapidly in the 15th century and becoming the most popular instrument among courtiers and commoners in the 16th century. Henry VIII played the lute, and made sure that his three children – the future monarchs Edward VI, “Bloody” Mary, and Elizabeth I – learned it, as well. The lute was also a popular feature in late Elizabethan and early Jacobean theatre, which was enjoying its own golden age in the works of William Shakespeare and Ben Jonson.

John Dowland, an indisputable master of the lute and lute song repertoire, is quite ‘Shakespearian’ in the range of emotion and expression found in his music, and in his ability to absorb and synthesize the cultural influences of his day.

Bach arranged his Fifth Cello Suite for the lute which gives us unsuspected harmonies and a better understanding of how and where Bach would add ornaments. Thomas Dunford, following in Bach’s footsteps, arranged Bach’s First Cello Suite for archlute, a lute with an extended neck and unstoppable bass strings like the theorbo.

Giovanni Girolamo Kapsperger was an Austrian-Italian virtuoso performer and highly original composer whose compositions for the lute and theorbo were fundamental in the development of these as solo instruments.

This concert is generously supported by José Verstappen.

A New Springtime of the World

Friday, October 28, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Ensemble Diabolus in Musica

During the 12th century, as the famous historian, Georges Duby said, “a new springtime of the world blossomed, on the old Latin stock.” The unchanging social order which prevailed before the year 1000 was now jostled by the feudal system. In southern France castles and monasteries were built, far from the declining influence of the king or the pope. Painting, sculpture, architecture, and music celebrated the beauty of the world in a new way.

In the same regions and exactly at the same time, Roman art flourished and new chants were being created in the generous acoustics of these new basilicas and chapels. In the domains of the great Saint-Martial de Limoges abbey notably, polyphony birthed its first audacious and jubilant elaborations, and the first notated secular songs of France were being created by the troubadours who celebrated courtly love.

Diabolus in Musica is a French medieval music ensemble founded in Paris in 1992. Now under the direction of Nicolas Sansarlat, the ensemble continues to programme rediscovered Medieval works alongside the richness of the well-known musical works by the Troubadours, Trouvères and the Notre Dame School.

This concert is generously supported by Elaine Adair & Agnes Hohn.

Boccheriniana

Friday, October 14, 2022 | 7:30 p.m.Christ Church Cathedral

Artists: Members of the Accademia de’ Dissonanti – Elinor Frey, cello and direction; Laura Andriani, violin; Rossella Croce, violin; Isaac Chalk, viola; and Jan De Winne, flute

Boccheriniana celebrates one of the most delightful and original voices of the classical era, Luigi Boccherini, alongside European composers from the same era, Mozart, J.C. Bach, and Maddalena Lombardini Sirmen. During this time, now known for its elegant ‘galant’ music, Boccherini championed his instrument, the cello, and played as a travelling virtuoso until he settled in Madrid as court composer. Our concert showcases a variety of chamber music favourites: flute quintets, string trio, and quartets. Building on a successful 2020 tour, the program of the group Accademia de’ Dissonanti reunites string players Laura Andriani, Rossella Croce, Isaac Chalk, and Elinor Frey, together with the celebrated traverso player, Jan De Winne, flute professor at the Paris and Brussels conservatories.

This concert is generously supported by Zelie & Vincent Tan and Birgit Westergaard.