WTJU Dec 18th, 2020 | By Ralph Graves
For the past four years, the #ClassicsaDay team has adopted Classical Christmas as its theme for December. And why not? We have a rich body of music related to the season dating back to the Middle Ages. A good deal of it is religious, but not all many works are simply inspired by the time of year.
As always, I tried to select music that I hadn’t shared before while avoiding the obvious (like Vivaldi’s “Winter”). Here are my posts for the third week of #ClassicalChristmas
12/14/20 Giovanni Gabrieli – O Magnum Mysterium
Gabrieli used the space at St. Mark’s like an instrument. His compositions for multiple choirs took into account the echos and delays of the sound, and how it could enhance the music. This work features two choirs of unequal size, adding dynamics to the mix.
Author of the article: Anthony Dixon
Publishing date: Dec 17, 2020 • December 17, 2020 • 1 minute read •
Article content
Pembroke Symphony Orchestra Strings and Friends and music director/conductor Mehdi Javanfar invite you to attend their Celebrate Christmas concert.
The performance features Corelli’s Christmas Concerto, Fantasia on Greensleeves, music from Handel’s Messiah and much more!
We apologize, but this video has failed to load.
Try refreshing your browser. Pembroke Symphona Orchestra Strings and Friends presents Celebrate Christmas! concert this Saturday Back to video
Celebrate Christmas! is an ambitious project aiming to bring live music to the community at a time when it is needed the most. The practical aspects of this undertaking required the organizers to walk a fine line within the boundaries of health and safety protocols while providing an outlet for the musicians to combine their love of music-making with their impassioned desire
Arcangelo Corelli’s Christmas Concerto (Concerto Grosso in G minor, Op. 6, No. 8) often turns up on classical Christmas music albums. And I admit I never quite understood why. To my ears, there wasn’t anything especially Christmassy about it.
That’s what makes this release so welcome. The liner notes explain the aesthetic behind these Italian Baroque Christmas concertos. And the album presents four examples that demonstrate that aesthetic.
In the early 1700s, Italian Christmas Eve services focused on the pastoral elements of the Nativity; the shepherds in the fields, the quiet of the evening, and the animals in the manger.
3 pm ET: London Philharmonic Orchestra presents
All the World’s a Stage. The LPO celebrates Brett Dean, their new Composer in Residence, with the UK premiere of
The Players. The scene is Elsinore, setting of Dean’s opera
Hamlet, with the solo role played by accordion player James Crabb. The concert begins with Bach’s
Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and ends with Stravinsky’s mock-Baroque
Pulcinella. View here.
6 pm ET: Philadelphia Chamber Music Society presents
Mark Steinberg, Marcy Rosen, and Jonathan Biss play Beethoven. Celebrate Beethoven’s 250th birthday as three chamber music luminaries play a program of early masterworks: Cello Sonata in G Minor, Op. 5 No. 2, Violin Sonata in A, Op. 30, No. 1, and Piano Trio in G, Op. 1, No. 2. View here. LIVE
ONLINE: Madison Bach Musicians
Madison Bach Musicians director Trevor Stephenson and soprano Estelà Gomez.
It turns out that the orderly, rational progressions of Bach are a perfect calming soundtrack to the current moment. Enjoy the extraordinary work of Johann Sebastian Bach at the Madison Bach Musicians 10th annual Baroque Holiday Concert. There will be other music, too, from Braun, Charpentier, Corelli, DallâAbaco and Telemann. And more good news, for fans of Bach s solo cello suites: Baroque cellist James Waldo will perform Cello Suite No. 4 in E-flat major. This online event begins at 7:30 pm with a live lecture by MBM director Trevor Stephenson (