Con Gioia, directed by Preethi de Silva, acclaimed expert on the performance of the keyboard music of C.P.E. Bach, will devote the next two seasons beginning in November 2013 to concerts of chamber music and solo keyboard and orchestral works by the composer to commemorate his 300th birthday in March 2014.
Born in Weimar, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach was the second son of J. S. Bach and his wife Maria Barbara and more famous than his father and considered “an original genius” in the late eighteenth century. He served at the court of Frederic the Great in Berlin and Potsdam for almost twenty years before accepting an appointment of director of music of the five main protestant churches and cantor at the Johanneum in Hamburg, as the successor to Georg Philipp Telemann (his godfather).
A summary follows of Con Gioia’s two programs in 2013-2014, which will be followed by two others in 2014-2015. The concerts will feature artists performing on period instruments, including a German-style harpsichord with exquisite chinoiserie (see photo attached) and an eighteenth-century Viennese-style fortepiano.
Concert I, on Sunday, November 17, 2013 at 3:30 p.m., at the historic Church of the Angels at 1100 Avenue 64 in Pasadena: (www.coa-pasadena.org)
Keyboard solos and chamber music for harpsichord, viola da gamba, violin, and flute.
Concert II, on Saturday, March 8, 2104 (the composer’s 300th birthday). 4:00 p.m.
Thayer Hall, Colburn School of Music, Los Angeles:
Concertos for flute and for harpsichord, solos for fortepiano, Duo Sonata (Sanguineus und Melancholicus) for violins, and the Fortepiano Quartet in D Major.
Participating artists in next season include, Stephen Schultz and Julie Long (transverse flute), Janet Worsley Strauss and Andrew McIntosh (baroque violins), Leif Woodward (baroque cello), Gabriel Golden (violone) and Preethi de Silva (harpsichord and fortepiano). For further information see www.congioia.org or call 909.624.0638 after September 1.
