The final programme of Confluence Concerts season took place at Heliconian Hall on Wednesday night. It was billed as The Confluence Songbook and, if there was a theme, it was about doing live versions of music that had been streamed during the Plague. But really by the time we saw it it had outgrown that. For, in addition to the full line up of Confluence artistic associates there was a raft of guests which resulted in a fairly lengthy and very eclectic programme. Continue reading
The Whole Gang and Then Some
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Invocazioni Mariane is a new CD from counter-tenor Andreas Scholl and his long time collaborators the Accademia Bizantina and their conductor Alessandro Tampieri. It consists of 18th century music from Naples; all of which is in some way connected with the Virgin Mary and is mostly drawn from oratorios or similar pieces designed to be performed during Holy Week. Back in the day, with women not permitted on the stage in Naples (or the Papal States) the high parts would have been sung by castrati. That, of course, is where Scholl comes in.
The idea of recreating an accademia musicale (private concert) at the home of Roman artist/patron Pier Leone Ghezzi in 1723 and putting on works that might have been played at such an event is an intriguing one. Add to that that we were promised caricatures; Ghezzi being a noted pioneer of the form. Marco Cera, who conceived the show, seemed to be onto a good thing.
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