Tempting you with Baroque
From violin and piano to string orchestra and opera, here’s a few exquisite Baroque gems to tempt you.
Hidden in Plain Sight with Rachel Podger & Daniele Caminiti
Here’s an intriguing combination: one of the world’s finest Baroque violinists (and recent winner of BBC Music magazine’s Record of the Year), Rachel Podger, and expert theorbo player Daniele Caminiti. The theorbo (in case you’re wondering) is a long-necked relative of the lute with a beguiling sound to take you straight back in time. This is a chance discover some less familiar early Baroque music (including Fontana, Biber and Isabella Leonarda) alongside that of Vivaldi and Bach, in the perfect setting of Lichfield Cathedral.
Rachel Podger is a Festival Associate Artist for 2023-2025.
Danny Driver plays the Goldberg Variations
Why not spend a delightful hour enjoying Bach’s famous Goldberg Variations in the company of Associate Artist and pianist, Danny Driver. Bach’s 30 magical variations on an aria was supposedly written for the 14-year old Johann Goldberg to play for his employer when he was struggling to get to sleep. Hopefully, in this Sunday morning concert, that won’t be an issue! It certainly won’t be for Danny, as the technical challenges make the Goldberg Variations a pinnacle of the piano repertoire.
A favourite Bach Brandenburg Concerto from the Yehudi Menuhin School Orchestra
The Menuhin School are firm favourites at Lichfield. They’ve visited the Festival several times and never fail to dazzle with their astonishingly polished performances and youthful exuberance. Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No 6 features in their concert of music for string orchestra. Without violins, two violas take the leading role which give a uniquely mellow quality to this favourite work.
Handel’s Orlando
Liberata Collective are rediscovering the lost art of ‘baroque gesture’ in a bid to offer modern audiences the unique experience that Handel’s own audiences would have had. “We live in such a visual world, but ‘visual’ doesn’t need to mean extravagant special effects,” says Liberata Collective. “Baroque gestures really draw the eye, and audiences can see how the singers are involved not just vocally but also bodily in the performance.” They’re joined by period instrument specialists Ensemble Hesperi in Handel’s opera about a pagan princess, a soldier and a shepherdess.
Bach by Candlelight with Jiaxin & Julian Lloyd Webber
We’re thrilled to welcome Lichfield Festival Patron Julian Lloyd Webber and his wife, the international cellist Jiaxin Lloyd Webber, to close this year’s Festival with an atmospheric candlelit concert in Lichfield Cathedral. Julian tells the fascinating story of the Bach Cello Suites – effectively lost for over 200 years – and Jiaxin will play Suites Nos 1 & 3.