MUSICAL ANTIDOTES TO A PLAGUE: Baroque Cantatas, Arias & Instrumental Music

301 North Orange Grove Boulevard,Pasadena CA 91103

06 November, 2021

Description

A special concert honoring COVID-19 victims and those helping. Program: arias and cantatas & instrumental music by Bach, Telemann & Keiser. Con Gioia Early Music Ensemble, directed by Preethi de Silva, will present a concert of vocal and instrumental music celebrating its 40th season.This special concert with free admission will honor victims of COVID-19 and those helping them. The program will include arias and cantatas for vocal soloists and obbligato instrumentalists by J.S. Bach, Reinhard Keiser, and Georg Phillip Telemann, and a harpsichord solo by Bach. The arias by Bach include solos and duets from cantatas BWV 32, 42, 84, 97, 105, 108,123, and 125. The other works include a rarely performed opera aria by Keiser and a complete cantata by Telemann. The program will feature three acclaimed local singers, Andrea Zomorodian, soprano; Jon Lee Keenan, tenor; and John Buffett, baritone. They will be supported on period instruments by musicians performing obbligato (solo) parts: Andrew McIntosh and Kati Kyme, baroque violinists; Lot Demeyer, oboist; Julie Long, flautist; William Skeen, ’cellist; and Preethi de Silva, harpsichordist/director as well as other string players. See more at www.congioia.org Con Gioia's programs in 2009-2010 included commemorations of the anniversaries of the deaths of Handel (d.1759) and Haydn (d.1809), and the births of Purcell (b. 1659) and Margravine Wilhelmine of Bayreuth (b. 1709), and works by contemporary composers. Con Gioia's CD, Harmonic Labyrinth, featuring Preethi de Silva and cellist Rohan de Saram was released in 2011 by First Hand Records in the U.K. In 2011, Con Gioia commemorated its 30th anniversary and in March 2012 performed in the renowned Concerts from the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, to celebrate Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s 298th birthday. In 2013–2014 and 2014–1015, the ensemble will offer four concerts honoring the 300th birthday of C. P. E. Bach (1714–88). See our “Concerts” page for details of the first two programs, and our “Recordings” page for a special offer on compact discs of music by C. P. E. Bach. The ensemble presented four concerts of vocal and instrumental music in 2013–2014 and 2014–2015 in commemoration of the 300th birthday of C.P.E. Bach. The programs included three concertos and a symphony and a gala concert on the composer’s birthday on March 8, 2014, at the Colburn School of Music, Los Angeles. We also offered a performance of rarely heard works for two harpsichords as well as one honoring commemorating the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. In fall 2016 we performed a program, “A Classical Viennese Soirée,” and in spring 2017 we offered virtuoso works by composers at the magnificent Dresden Court of the eighteenth century. Most recently, Con Gioia presented a program of sonatas, concertos, arias and a quartet commemorating the 250th anniversary of the death of George Philipp Telemann, which garnered exceptional praise.