The Early Moderns

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 The brilliant American ensemble Quicksilver — “Revered like rock stars within the early music scene” (New York Times) — performs a program of music from the mid-17th century, when the modern world was emerging in Europe and composers were writing revolutionary works that cast of the conventions of the Renaissance and brought a dramatic and virtuosic approach to instrumental music.

The program features the sonatas of composers including Schmeltzer, Kerll, Rosenmüller, Buxtehude and Weichlein.

Music had a cultural revolution in the seventeenth century: it suddenly became modern. This “new music” of dramatic oppositions and vivid emotions found its voice in a new form, the sonata, a pure instrumental work with no agenda but the imagination of the composer – and no standard form but the passionate give-and-take of friends in conversation.

Quicksilver’s concert is a celebration of this new style, bringing to life the extravagant and sumptuous sonatas which were created first by virtuoso instrumental composers in Italy, and then taken up in Germany.

Program:

PROGRAM

Sonata no. 9 à 4                                                          Matthias Weckmann (1616–1674)          

Ciacona                                                                       Nicolaus à Kempis (c.1600–1676)

     from Ludwig Partiturbuch, 1662

Sonata cinque a tre                                                   Philippe van Wichel (1614–1675)

     from Fascilus dulcedinis, Opusculum Primum, 1678

Sonata no. 5 à 3                                                          Carolus Hacquart (c.1640–1686)

     from Harmonia Parnassia Sonatarum, 1686

Sonata no. 2 à 4                                                          Matthias Weckmann (1616–1674)          

Sonata à 4 in G Major, La Carolietta                         Johann Schmeltzer (c.1623–1680)

     from Kromeriz, 1669

— intermission —

Sonata decima à 3                                                    Dario Castello (1602–1631)

     from Sonate Concertate in Stil Moderno, Libro II, 1629

Sonata à 4 in D minor                                              Johann Rosenmuller (1619–1684)

from Sonate a 2. 3. 4. e 5. Stromenti da arco & altri, 1682

Praeludium in G minor, BuxWV 163                      Dieterich Buxtehude (1637–1707)

Sonata à 2 in F major                                              Johann Kaspar Kerll (1627–1693)

from Codex Rost, c.1660

Sonata decimaquarta                                               Dario Castello (1602–1631)

from Sonate Concertate in Stil Moderno, Libro II, Venice 1629