Early Music New York Announces Monteverdi Echoes

On Saturday, May 5, Early Music New York (EM/NY) will reverse direction.

Its winter holiday program, "Burgundian Christmas," was devoted to Renaissance composers from the Low Countries (Flanders and Holland), who exerted a strong influence on their counterparts in the south. For its spring celebration, "Monteverdi Echoes," EM/NY will start in the south, with Italian composers of the early baroque period whose works (as well as some of the composers) crossed over the Alps to Austria, Germany and other outposts of the Habsburg empire. Additional works by northern composers who adopted the new Italian style will round out the program.

One distinguishing characteristic of this era is a new emphasis on pictorialism in music. "Perhaps it is no coincidence that opera had its beginnings in Italy, arising with the baroque period," says EM/NY Founder/Director Frederick Renz. "Composers had always been interested in representation, but this new focus on the dramatic found fertile ground in the early Italian baroque masters, more than a century before Vivaldi's Four Seasons.

"One prime example is Farina's Capriccio stravagante, with stringed instruments imitating such other instruments as flute, trumpet, guitar; then venturing into the animal kingdom - chickens, cats, dogs. The Bohemian-born Biber took a page from Italy's playbook with his Battalia, which encompasses the full range of wartime, from patriotic tunes (the strings imitating fife and drum) and drunken soldiers to discharging cannons and the sorrowful aftermath of battle."

Concert Information

MONTEVERDI ECHOES

Venice to Vienna

Saturday, May 5, 2018 at 7:30 pm

First Church of Christ, Scientist, Central Park West at 68th Street, NYC

Program to include

Claudio Monteverdi (1567 - 1643)

Five Ritornelli and Moresca, from the opera Orfeo (1607)

Heinrich Ignaz von Biber (1644 - 1704)

Battalia (1673)

Carlo Farina (c.1600 - 1639)

Capriccio stravagante (1627)

Johann Heinrich Schmelzer (c.1620-23 - 1680)

Sonata a sei from Sacro-Profanus (1662)

Additional sonatas and canzonas by 17-century Italian contemporaries

(program subject to change)

Early Music New York - Frederick Renz, Director

Tickets

$40.00 reserved seats, $20.00 student (w/valid ID, available at door, day of)

Tickets available by phone (212-280-0330), on-line (www.EarlyMusicNY.org) and at the door, half an hour prior to performance.

Group discounts available by telephone. All major credit cards accepted.

FREDERICK RENZ - DIRECTOR

Frederick Renz, Founder/Director of the Early Music Foundation, is internationally acclaimed for his work as a conductor, producer, director, performer and scholar, presenting music and music drama from the eleventh through the eighteenth centuries. He has received commissions from the Spoleto Festival, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, and the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, as well as individual grants from the National Endowment for the Arts and the Ingram Merrill Foundation. Maestro Renz has been awarded a doctorate honoris causa by the State University of New York, Fredonia. Detailed bio available on request.

EARLY MUSIC NEW YORK / EARLY MUSIC FOUNDATION

Early Music Foundation (EMF), a not-for-profit organization founded in 1974, is Artist-in-Residence at the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York City. Under the leadership of Frederick Renz, EMF's mission is to foster public understanding and appreciation of music and music drama from the eleventh through the eighteenth centuries.

EMF presents the historical performance ensemble and orchestra EARLY MUSIC NEW YORK - FREDERICK RENZ, DIRECTOR; operates the recording label Ex cathedra Records; and a administers a service-to-the-field project, "New York Early Music Central" (NYEMC), sponsoring/managing city-wide festivals serving the NYC historically-informed artist community.

Now in its forty-third season, Early Music New York reaps international acclaim for vibrant and provocative performances of historically informed repertoire from the medieval through the classical eras.

About the Venue

The First Church of Christ, Scientist is located in the heart of the Lincoln Square neighborhood, within the landmark Central Park West Historic District. Designed by Frederick Comstock, the copper-domed Beaux-Arts-style edifice dates from the turn of the 20th century, when it was built and originally dedicated as the Second Church of Christ, Scientist.

About its square-proportioned auditorium, NYC-Arts says, "With raked seating, First Church of Christ, Scientist's ambient and acoustical clarity is an ideal venue for chamber and orchestra performance."

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