Concerts & Events Archive
From Virginals to Harpsichords by Dr Dan Tidhar
Insight Lecture-recital
Saturday 9 February 2019, 6pm
The Pavilion Room, Hughes Hall
Early keyboard instruments which involve plucking of strings (sometimes simply referred to as “plucked keyboard instruments”) come in many different sizes and shapes, which vary according to time, geography, musical style and function.
This lecture-recital will focus on three distinguished members of this family of instruments: the virginals, the Italian single-manual harpsichord and the French double-manual harpsichord. Dr Tidhar will present fine examples of these instruments, outline the structural and acoustic similarities and differences between them, and will demonstrate how these affect the particular idioms of composition and performance for which the individual instruments are particularly suitable.
The musical examples will include excerpts from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, early English and Italian Baroque as well as high Baroque German and French harpsichord music.
Saturday 9 February 2019, 6pm
The Pavilion Room, Hughes Hall
Early keyboard instruments which involve plucking of strings (sometimes simply referred to as “plucked keyboard instruments”) come in many different sizes and shapes, which vary according to time, geography, musical style and function.
This lecture-recital will focus on three distinguished members of this family of instruments: the virginals, the Italian single-manual harpsichord and the French double-manual harpsichord. Dr Tidhar will present fine examples of these instruments, outline the structural and acoustic similarities and differences between them, and will demonstrate how these affect the particular idioms of composition and performance for which the individual instruments are particularly suitable.
The musical examples will include excerpts from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, early English and Italian Baroque as well as high Baroque German and French harpsichord music.
The Caius to a Baroque Christmas
The Choir of Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge | The Caius Consort
Thursday 6 December 2018, 8pm
Great St Mary's Church
Gonville & Caius College Choir (dir. Geoffrey Webber) present Charpentier's rarely performed Messe de Minuit pour Noël with the Caius Consort (dir. Rachel Stroud).
Alongside the Charpentier which is based on beautiful French noëls, Caius College Choir promises sparkle with baubles by other Baroque masters including Weckmann’s dramatic dialogue for the Annunciation with recorders and violins, Buxtehude’s extended Christmas concerto with its charming refrain telling of the newborn child, and a magnificent Christmas Day motet by Schütz. Between these vocal works we hear some remarkable organ music by Weckmann and an anonymous virtuoso violin sonata on the chorale Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern performed by Rachel Stroud.
Great St Mary's Church
Gonville & Caius College Choir (dir. Geoffrey Webber) present Charpentier's rarely performed Messe de Minuit pour Noël with the Caius Consort (dir. Rachel Stroud).
Alongside the Charpentier which is based on beautiful French noëls, Caius College Choir promises sparkle with baubles by other Baroque masters including Weckmann’s dramatic dialogue for the Annunciation with recorders and violins, Buxtehude’s extended Christmas concerto with its charming refrain telling of the newborn child, and a magnificent Christmas Day motet by Schütz. Between these vocal works we hear some remarkable organ music by Weckmann and an anonymous virtuoso violin sonata on the chorale Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern performed by Rachel Stroud.
“Superb sound, and singing burgeoning with colour and confidence” (BBC Music Magazine, A Caius Christmas)
"Sung with vivid assurance... the results are rich and engaging" (The Guardian)
“An excellent body of sound and extraordinarily agile voices” (Neue Zürcher Zeitung)
"Sung with vivid assurance... the results are rich and engaging" (The Guardian)
“An excellent body of sound and extraordinarily agile voices” (Neue Zürcher Zeitung)
