3rd Hong Kong Early Music Festival 2023: Innovation Through Tradition ( Concert no.1- Music Before Bach ), ( Concert no.2 -Bach’s Contemporaries and Beyond )Concerto da Camera Limited
Our first Innovation Through Tradition concert for the 3rd Hong Kong Early Music Festival 2023, we will perform works written by composers who came before Bach, from the late Renaissance to early Baroque. Then, in our second concert, we will pay tribute to Bach’s contemporaries and successors. We will also premiere a new piece – inspired by Bach – Carousel of Illusions, commissioned by Concerto da Camera and written by Hong Kong composer Dr. Yau May Kay.
Our journey begins in Venice, the epicentre of musical creativity from the second half of the 16th century to early 17th century. Many German early Baroque composers went there to study and work. They helped transport the Venetian styles and musical idioms north. The styles and traditions of the German Baroque that they had then forged and developed would, a century later, culminated in the works of Bach.
Bach had never left Germany once in his life. He studied and absorbed stylistic aspects of his contemporaries from across Europe through copying, arranging and transcribing their pieces. His own music was also being adapted by the other composers, so, one could imagine that the influence was mutual.
Dared to experiment, and to push limits that many deemed unalterable, Bach never ceases to fascinate us. Music presenter, Eugene Leung, will accompany us on this journey. He will tell us about the story behind the music and fun facts about the composers. Who inspired Bach? And how? By revisiting the people and the music that influenced the great man himself, we continue to discover new horizons in this inexhaustible universe of music.
The music style of the Venetian School was very much inspired by the spacious, resonant architecture of St Mark’s Basilica in Venice. It is only fitting, then, for us to hold our concerts in one of the oldest churches in Hong Kong, St Andrew’s Church Kowloon. Audience will be able to venerate an important heritage of the city while savouring the acoustic quality the architecture has to offer. What’s more, audience will have the chance to enjoy a truly new experience of hearing the harpsicord and cornetto, alongside the baroque oboe, baroque bassoon, baroque violin, and baroque cello, play the music that was originally written for them.
These instruments were popular between the 16th and 18th century but later obscured by their modern successors. They had been gradually brought back to the mainstage since the early music revival that started in the 19th century, as composers and musicians look back on history in search of fresh ideas. Audiences are welcomed to come chat with our musicians after the concerts and see the instruments up close!
Cornetto: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bGcTqyC44xg
- Free Seating.
