Encounters - The Early Music Weekend
The Southbank Centre has, for many years, started its annual season (running September to early July) with an Early Music Weekend investigating the many facets of early music. In 2007, Encounters is programmed by early music expert Tess Knighton and offers various interfaces between Europe and the wider world - east via Arabia to China and west to the New World.
Tess Knighton herself introduces the weekend before the first concert, given by Musica Secreta and Celestial Sirens (Queen Elizabeth Hall, 7.30pm), which uses film, live music and theatre to tell of a young 17th-century noblewomen forced from a secular life into an Italian convent.
Saturday starts off with Paris-based XVIII-21 Musique des Lumières and Chinese ensemble Fluer de Prunus filling the Purcell Room (3pm) with music by 17th- and 18th-century missionaries who made it as far east as China, bringing together works by Matteo Rici and Joseph-Marie Amiot as well as traditional Chinese music. After a discussion about the cultural mixes that resulted in the wake of missionary zeal, L'Apreggiata, directed by Christine Pluhar, team up with the King's Singers for a lively Queen Elizabeth Hall programme (7pm) entitled Los Impossibles, exploring songs and dances from the old and new worlds. Finally, back in the Purcell Room, soprano Catherine Bott explores, in Convivencia (Purcell Room, 9.30pm), western (both Christian and Jewish) and Arabic traditions as found in 15th- and 16th-century Castilian songs by the likes of Luis Milán, Diego Pisador and Luis de Narváes.
On Sunday, the King's Singers, this time joined by His Majestys Sagbutts & Cornetts, recreate the time when Schutz, going to Venice to study with the Italian, met Gabrieli (Queen Elizabeth Hall, 2pm). The life of Handel's famous castrato Farinelli is explored by counter-tenor Nicholas Clapton (Purcell Room, 3.30pm) while, over at the BFI Southbank, Gérard Corbiau's 1994 film biography Farinelli, played by Stefano Dionisi is showing (4.30pm).
Another major meeting is commemorated in the final concert at the Queen Elizabeth Hall (7.30pm). When Bach met Buxtehude takes us back to the time when Bach walked 200 miles to hear Buxtehude play the organ. Buxtehude died 300 years ago this year, and both Fretwork and the Choir of Clare College Cambridge, directed by Richard Boothby help commemorate both men.
Related Information
Website: Southbank Centre Early Music Weekend Website
Website: L'Arpeggiata Website
Website: King's Singers Website
Website: Musica Secreta Website
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