Pastorale – Italian Baroque Christmas Music
| Giuseppe Torelli (1658 – 1709) | Concerto Grosso in G minor op. 8/6 ‘in forma di Pastorale per il Santissimo Natale’ |
| George Frideric Handel (1685 – 1759) | Gloria in B flat major |
| Francesco Manfredini (1684 – 1762) | Concerto Grosso in C major op. 3/12 ‘Pastorale per il Santissimo Natale’ |
| Antonio Vivaldi (1678 – 1741) | Bassoon Concerto in A minor RV497 |
| Concerto in D major RV392 for viola d’amore & strings | |
| Alessandro Scarlatti (1660 – 1725) | ‘O di Betlemme altera povertà’, Cantata pastorale per la nascità di Nostro Signore |
- Claire Tomlin soprano
- Sally Holman bassoon
- Tassilo Erhardt viola d’amore
- Essex Baroque Orchestra
- directed by Peter Holman
Around 1700, Italian composers frequently celebrated Christmas by writing concertos which imitated the bagpipes played by shepherds around the crib. This programme contrasts concertos of this sort by Torelli & Manfredini with concertos for bassoon and viola d’amore by Vivaldi. The programme also includes the delightful Cantata Pastorale by Alessandro Scarlatti and the first East Anglian performance of Handel’s youthful Gloria, rediscovered in London earlier this year.
Claire Tomlin, Sally Holman and Tassilo Erhardt are three of the outstanding musicians of the younger generation associated with the Suffolk Villages Festival. In July Sally & Tassilo’s group Apollo & Pan won the Early Music Network International Young Artists’ Competition at the National Centre for Early Music in York.