Willem Elsschot was a lover of words, but also of music: his family fondly recall how music sounded all over the place through records and radio, and how daughter Adèle played the piano daily. Outside the home one of Elsschot’s favourite series was the Early Music Concerts at the Rubens House: he subscribed for many years and was an ardent fan there. As successor of this series, AMUZ felt obliged to organise a musical ode to Elsschot. And how could this challenge be met more adequately than by drawing from the repertoire he liked most? The result is a mosaic of baroque masterpieces from composers such as Bach, Corelli, Boccherini, Scarlatti, Vivaldi, and Händel. Fabulous music, played by an ad hoc ensemble of outstanding musicians from the circle of AMUZ friends, joining forces especially for this occasion.

Performers
Peter Van Heyghen, recorder | Roel Dieltiens, violoncello | Jurgen De bruyn, lute | Kris Verhelst, harpsichord | a.o.
 

31 October, 2010 14:00 -- AMUZ

After brilliant experiments by Joseph Haydn and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart the piano trio matured into a full-fledged genre only in the hands of Ludwig van Beethoven. The Piano Trio in e-flat, opus 70, nr 2 from 1808 still shows traces of the old masters, but sounds undeniably more modern. The violin and the cello are much more prominent and the finale betrays Beethoven’s impetuous temperament. Robert Schumann wrote the Piano Trio nr 1 in 1847, his productive year for chamber music. It was his birthday gift to his wife Clara, who noted in her diary: ‘It sounds like the work of someone with high expectations, so youthful and powerful and concurrently completed with such mastery. The opening is among the very few finest that I know.’ Such passionate scores demand passionate performers: Andreas Staier, Daniel Sepec and Roel Dieltiens are their perfect match. This is going to be auditive spoiling!

Performers
Daniel Sepec, violin | Roel Dieltiens, violoncello | Andreas Staier, fortepiano

 

05 November, 2010 20:00 -- AMUZ

In 2002, when they were still known under the name Liber Unusualis, they were the convincing winners of the International Young Artists’ Presentation. Today they are back in Antwerp as a mature ensemble. Ensemble Liber elaborated a project around 14th-century music on texts by Francesco Petrarca, Giovanni Boccacco, Franco Sachetti and their French contemporaries. This ode to the fathers of humanism samples songs by Jacopo da Bologna, Niccolo da Perugia, Guillaume de Machault, Gilles Binchois and the poet-composer Francesco Landini, who was honoured with a laurel crown by king Peter of Cyprus. Crowned with Laurels earned the Noah Greenberg Award of the American Musicological Society for outstanding contributions to historically informed performance practice. A CD recording is in the works, but AMUZ offers you already the inside scoop of the live performance!

Performers
Andrew Rader, countertenor | Carrie Henneman Shaw, soprano | William Hudson, tenor | Sumner Thompson, bariton

Programme
Niccolò da Perugia, Gilles Binchois, Guillaume de Machaut a.o.
 

07 November, 2010 14:00 -- AMUZ

Our time can be considered as a converging and ending point of numerous time cycles. The Mayan calendar as well as the biblical and the alchemist’s one point 2012 out as the year of the Apocalypse and the time of prophecies. ‘O, Monde aveugle’ depicts man in his blind fear of the unknown, confronted with a profound sense of moral turmoil. The beast in man is revealed and his destructive nature surfaces, he is lead by the uncanny comical and obscene. The confrontation with his self sets off a shift of consciousness, a transformation leading to a new age, with an exit towards new energies. Together with their fellows from the internationally acclaimed crossover project ‘Les Tisserands’, Zefiro Torna creates a band pondering this theme in a way reminiscent of the satires in Jeroen Bosch’s Renaissance paintings. A variety of old, modern, and hybrid instruments provide the accompaniment for songs that are sometimes striking and on other moments conveying purifying thoughts. The music is mainly based on older sources from the Trecento and Renaissance, but also contains compositions for the new age. The program is made up of ballads, madrigals, lamentation, ‘blasons’ and instrumental music by Jacopo da Bologna, Johannes Ciconia, Cristobal de Morales, Clemens non Papa, Cipriano de Rore, Georges Brassens and Jowan Merckx. Els Van Laethem set texts by anonymous Roman poets, Petrarch and Michelangelo to her melodious song lines.
Note: this concert starts at 8 p.m.!

Performers:
Zefiro Torna: Warre Borgmans, narrator (Dutch spoken) | Els Van Laethem, soprano, trombone, marine trumpet, compositions | Jowan Merckx, flutes, crumhorn, bagpipe, percussion, compositions | Philippe Laloy, soprano saxophone, alto crumhorn, bass flute | Gwen Cresens, bandoneon | Vincent Noiret, double bass | Jurgen De bruyn, lutes, artistic direction

 

 

 

11 November, 2010 19:00 -- AMUZ

The Flemish Radio Choir selected two exceptional a capella requiems for the period around All Saints’ and All Souls’ Day. Pierre de La Rue’s Requiem, exploring mainly the lower compass of the voice, is one of the earliest polyphonous Masses for the Dead. This key work from the renaissance is juxtaposed with Herbert Howells’ Requiem from 1936. The composer wrote it in the aftermath of the tragic death of his nine-year-old son. Strangely enough this extremely pure and compassionate music – a genuine masterpiece within the English choir tradition – was published only in 1980, due to Howells’ severe sense of self-criticism. The concert programme will be capped with The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, an imposing piece for twelve voices by chief conductor Bo Holten, based on texts by the visionary poet William Blake.

Performers
Bo Holten, artistic direction

Programme
Pierre de La Rue: Requiem | Herbert Howells: Requiem | Bo Holten: The Marriage of Heaven and Hell
 

13 November, 2010 20:00 -- AMUZ

While in the 17th century on the European continent the French and Italian baroque styles flourished, England stayed an island with values and customs of its own. It was very typical that the latest fashion, the opera, did not manage to get a foothold there: the English loved spoken drama. Occasional stage music was about the only consolation for their composers. It was only with the arrival of the German Georg Friedrich Händel that London fell for the new lyrical art. Il Fondamento offers a representative English baroque programme with stage music by Henry Purcell and William Croft. Furthermore the programme contains instrumental works by James Paisible and Thomas Arne. The latter was, next to Händel and Boyce, one of the most important composers in 18th-century London.

Performers
Dirk Vandaele, violin | Paul Dombrecht, artistic direction

Programme
Henry Purcell: Selection out of The Fairy Queen | Charles Avison: Concerto Grosso | Thomas A. Arne: Ouverture in F – Sinfonie in C | William Croft: Suite ‘The comedy call’d funeral’

 

14 November, 2010 14:00 -- AMUZ