Per Sua Maestà Cesarea e Cattolica, La Serenissima, Wigmore Hall, 9 September 2018

I can’t really explain why this concert didn’t really float our boat – it just didn’t. Janie and I were both feeling unusually tired that early evening – both short of energy for venturing out. We had been enjoying following the cricket and tennis over the weekend, the latter until reasonably late I suppose, but that wouldn’t normally put us off.

La Serenissima is an unusually large troupe for the Wigmore Hall – there as a lot of juggling and jiggling to fit everyone on the stage, so it all felt a bit busy.

The chorus missed their cue to enter right at the start of the performance, which led to more jiggling for stage space after the orchestra had prepared themselves spatially and tuned their instruments.

The concert was all music from the Imperial Court of Charles VI

I wanted to hear Caldara live as I had never heard any before. I rather liked his arias, actually. Quite beautiful.

I was amused that the first set was from Ormisda, re di Persia, singing praise to the God Mithras, about whom I myself lauded a few months ago following a Gresham Society visit to the London Mithraeum:

The London Mithraeum With The Gresham Society, 15 March 2018

But I knew the Conti comic opera material would not please Janie – nor did it much please me. In truth, the whole concert was a bit busy and noisy for us that night.

Come the interval, when we realised that the only substantially different piece on the schedule was a Vivaldi concerto, lovely though the RV171 undoubtedly is, we decided to make an early exit.  Here is Europa Gallant’s delightful recording, with Fabio Biondi on the fiddle:

The following is La Serenissima playing Caldara, but a sinfonia, not an aria – beautiful it is, though:

…and finally here is a Caldara aria, performed by Concerto Köln under Emmanuelle Haïm with the superb Philippe Jaroussky singing the aria.

Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin, Jean-Guihen Queyras, Xenia Löffler, Wigmore Hall, 6 February 2015

Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin…but in Berlin!

We have been keen on the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin for many years now after first seeing them at the Wigmore Hall yonks ago – March 2001 – and then several times since. We even went to see them when we were in Berlin – see above and click here for the Ogblog piece.

As for Jean-Guihen Queyras, I shall forever associate him with our trip to Burgundy in 2008, in particular the day we visited the Bresse services to taste their coveted Poulet-de-Bresse (possibly the best service station dish in the world) and then on to Bourg-en-Bresse where by chance I bought, amongst other music, Queyras’s recording of the Bach Cello Suites – click here for Ogblog of that trip… 

…or here to a link for that wonderful Bach Cello Suites recording, which I still listen to quite often, indeed I am listening to it as I type…

…but I digress…

Click here for a link to the stub for the delightful Wigmore Hall concert we went to see on 6 February 2015.

These work wonderfully for us on a Friday evening, as long as we are sufficiently disciplined to stop working early enough and get to The Wig without a rush; on this occasion we were.

The concert was mostly Vivaldi, with one religious Caldara work thrown in for good measure. Not only were the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin and Jean-Guihen Queyras superb (we were expecting plenty), but also Xenia Löffler – principal oboe for the Akademie – was also excellent.

Janie and I both loved this concert too.