The San Francisco Early Music Society Opens 2013-2014 with Local Trio OSTRAKA Tonight

The San Francisco Early Music Society's 2013-14 season opens this weekend, beginning tonight, October 11, and continuing through the 13th, 2013 with local trio OSTRAKA (Josh Lee, viola da gamba; John Lenti, lute; David Walker, baroque guitar). Founded in 2005 by viol virtuoso Lee, Ostraka was a finalist in Early Music America's 2012 Baroque Performance Competition. Ostraka performs a program titled Leaving Parnassus, tracing the rise and fall of the outrageous and refined French baroque style and its struggle against the fashionable forces of italianismethrough the works of Lully, de Visée, Caix d'Hervelois, Boismortier and Forqueray. The concert promises to be a tour de force of virtuosic solo and ensemble works for bass viol, theorbo and baroque guitar.

Under the reign of Louis XIV a concerted effort to codify an unmistakably French style in all the arts gained sway. The popularity of Italian art and culture, however, never ebbed in the French capital. For years the French and Italian styles coexisted and flourished, but slowly the refinement and grace associated with the French style gave way to the fire and bold expression of Italy. The struggle between these styles can be heard in the opening dance suite of Ostraka's program. Joseph Bodin de Boismortier's Suite en re mineur attempts to push the viol from its orthodox French roots towards a stylish italianisme.

Ostraka's program continues with an homage to Jean Baptiste Lully, the Florentine father of the French musical style. Lully melded the moody music of the Louis XIV's early court with the melodious and direct music of his native Italy in a manner that came to emblematize the French style. Ostraka performs passages from two of his theatrical works: the dark and sensuous Logistille from his tragedy Roland, and the joyous Chaconne des Arlequins from his collaboration with Molière on Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme.

After Lully, the program moves on to works by two composers frequently compared with Marin Marais: Louis de Caix d'Hervelois and Antoine Forqueray. Along with Marais, they were among the greatest viol players of their day. Caix's graceful character pieces have come to epitomize the French style, while Forqueray, something of a maverick, set out to forge a more progressive style, one marked by eccentric sequences of chords, a fingering technique more at home on non-fretted instruments, and the quick and asymmetrical bowing technique one might expect of a violinist.

One of Marin Marais' most recognizable and popular works, Les Folies d'Espagne, anchors Ostraka's program. Published just one year after Archangelo Corelli's legendary composition on the same theme, La Folia, Marais' composition seems to beg comparison; and, indeed, Marais' can be viewed as one of the most direct responses to the forces of italianisme to be found in the French Repertory for solo viol.

Ostraka's program moves on to two works for guitar, one by Robert de Visée, named "Guitar Master of the King" in 1719, and another by his Italian teacher Francesco Corbetta, considered the greatest guitar virtuoso of his time. The program concludes with a sonata by Michele Corrette that has come to be viewed as a testament to the final acquiescence of the French baroque style to the Italianate tastes that swept across Europe. Aware of the shifting musical tastes in Paris, Corrette's sonatas are more reminiscent of the cello and violin sonatas of Vivaldi than to the decorous style of Lully promoted in the court of Louis XIV.

When and where to catch Ostraka:

Friday, Oct. 11, 2013 | Palo Alto

8pm @ First Lutheran Church

600 Homer Avenue

Saturday, Oct. 12, 2013 | Berkeley

7:30pm @ St. John's Presbyterian Church

2727 College

Sunday, Oct. 13, 2013 | San Francisco

4pm @ St. Mark's Lutheran Church

1111 O'Farrell

Individual tickets are $35 General/$32 Seniors/$30 SFEMS members.

Subscriptions are $180 for the full 6-concert series ($160 for SFEMS members). Choose 3 concerts for $95 ($84 for SFEMS members).

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