Boston Baroque
Encyclopedia
Boston Baroque is the oldest continuing period instrument orchestra in North America. It was founded in 1973 by the American harpsichord
ist and conductor
, Martin Pearlman to present concerts of the Baroque
and Classical
repertoire on period instruments, drawing on the insights of the historical performance movement.
The Boston Baroque professional chamber chorus was established as an integral part of the ensemble in 1981.
With Pearlman as its music director, the ensemble presents an annual subscription concert series in Greater Boston
, Massachusetts
; has performed on tour in Carnegie Hall
, Chicago
's Shubert Theatre, Los Angeles
's Disney Hall, and at the Ravinia and Tanglewood
festivals; and has toured internationally.
The orchestra, originally named "Banchetto Musicale", was renamed Boston Baroque in 1992, when Telarc Records, in its first commitment to a period-instrument orchestra, signed the ensemble to produce a series of recordings of major Baroque and Classical repertoire for international commercial distribution. As of 2007, there are 18 recordings in the series, three of which have received Grammy nominations.
Boston Baroque is the resident professional ensemble for Boston University
's Historical Performance Program, where it is helping to train the next generation of period-instrument performers.
, Handel's Messiah, Purcell's Dido and Æneas, Monteverdi Vespers of 1610, Bach's Mass in B minor, Handel's Concerti Grossi, Op. 6, Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride
, Mozart's The Impresario and Mozart's Circle's The Beneficent Dervish, Handel's Music for Royal Fireworks and Water Music
, Bach: The Complete Orchestral Suites, Mozart: Flute Concertos and Symphony No. 41
"Jupiter", Vivaldi's Gloria, Bach's Magnificat, Cherubini's Requiem in C minor (1816) and March funèbre (1820), Beethoven's Elegiac Song (Elegischer Gesang
), Op. 118.
Boston Baroque has received three Grammy Nominations
Notable premiere recordings by Boston Baroque include:
Harpsichord
A harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
ist and conductor
Conducting
Conducting is the art of directing a musical performance by way of visible gestures. The primary duties of the conductor are to unify performers, set the tempo, execute clear preparations and beats, and to listen critically and shape the sound of the ensemble...
, Martin Pearlman to present concerts of the Baroque
Baroque music
Baroque music describes a style of Western Classical music approximately extending from 1600 to 1760. This era follows the Renaissance and was followed in turn by the Classical era...
and Classical
Classical period (music)
The dates of the Classical Period in Western music are generally accepted as being between about 1750 and 1830. However, the term classical music is used colloquially to describe a variety of Western musical styles from the ninth century to the present, and especially from the sixteenth or...
repertoire on period instruments, drawing on the insights of the historical performance movement.
The Boston Baroque professional chamber chorus was established as an integral part of the ensemble in 1981.
With Pearlman as its music director, the ensemble presents an annual subscription concert series in Greater Boston
Boston
Boston is the capital of and largest city in Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England" for its economic and cultural impact on the entire New England region. The city proper had...
, Massachusetts
Massachusetts
The Commonwealth of Massachusetts is a state in the New England region of the northeastern United States of America. It is bordered by Rhode Island and Connecticut to the south, New York to the west, and Vermont and New Hampshire to the north; at its east lies the Atlantic Ocean. As of the 2010...
; has performed on tour in Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall
Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, United States, located at 881 Seventh Avenue, occupying the east stretch of Seventh Avenue between West 56th Street and West 57th Street, two blocks south of Central Park....
, Chicago
Chicago
Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...
's Shubert Theatre, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
's Disney Hall, and at the Ravinia and Tanglewood
Tanglewood Music Festival
The Tanglewood Music Festival is a music festival held every summer on the Tanglewood estate in Lenox, Massachusetts in the Berkshire Hills in western Massachusetts....
festivals; and has toured internationally.
The orchestra, originally named "Banchetto Musicale", was renamed Boston Baroque in 1992, when Telarc Records, in its first commitment to a period-instrument orchestra, signed the ensemble to produce a series of recordings of major Baroque and Classical repertoire for international commercial distribution. As of 2007, there are 18 recordings in the series, three of which have received Grammy nominations.
Boston Baroque is the resident professional ensemble for Boston University
Boston University
Boston University is a private research university located in Boston, Massachusetts. With more than 4,000 faculty members and more than 31,000 students, Boston University is one of the largest private universities in the United States and one of Boston's largest employers...
's Historical Performance Program, where it is helping to train the next generation of period-instrument performers.
Notable performances
- Boston's period-instrument premiere of Handel's Messiah in 1981.
- American premiere of the opera ZoroastreZoroastreZoroastre is an opera by Jean-Philippe Rameau, first performed on 5 December 1749 at the Opéra in Paris. The libretto is by Louis de Cahusac. Zoroastre was the fourth of Rameau's tragédies en musique to be staged and the last to appear during the composer's own lifetime...
by Jean-Philippe RameauJean-Philippe RameauJean-Philippe Rameau was one of the most important French composers and music theorists of the Baroque era. He replaced Jean-Baptiste Lully as the dominant composer of French opera and is also considered the leading French composer for the harpsichord of his time, alongside François...
in 1983. - Boston's first period-instrument performances of the complete concertos of Johann Sebastian BachJohann Sebastian BachJohann Sebastian Bach was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
in 1984-1985 to mark Bach's Tercentenary. - American period-instrument premiere of Mozart's Don GiovanniDon GiovanniDon Giovanni is an opera in two acts with music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It was premiered by the Prague Italian opera at the Teatro di Praga on October 29, 1787...
, broadcast nationally on public radio in 1986. - American period-instrument premieres of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony and Violin ConcertoViolin Concerto (Beethoven)Ludwig van Beethoven's Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 61, was written in 1806.The work was premiered on 23 December 1806 in the Theater an der Wien in Vienna. Beethoven wrote the concerto for his colleague Franz Clement, a leading violinist of the day, who had earlier given him helpful advice on...
in 1987-88 - Boston's period-instrument premiere of Joseph HaydnJoseph HaydnFranz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
’s The Creation in 1989. - Modern world premiere of Der Stein der Weisen (The Philosopher's Stone) in 1998, a SingspielSingspielA Singspiel is a form of German-language music drama, now regarded as a genre of opera...
collaboratively written by members of Mozart's circle--with the likely participation of Mozart himself--which shed's new light on the composition of The Magic FluteThe Magic FluteThe Magic Flute is an opera in two acts composed in 1791 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart to a German libretto by Emanuel Schikaneder. The work is in the form of a Singspiel, a popular form that included both singing and spoken dialogue....
one year later. - Boston's first complete cycle of the three surviving Monteverdi operas (semi-staged in 2001-2003) with new performing versions of L'incoronazione di PoppeaL'incoronazione di PoppeaL'incoronazione di Poppea is an Italian baroque opera comprising a prologue and three acts, first performed in Venice during the 1642–43 carnival season. The music, attributed to Claudio Monteverdi, is a setting of a libretto by Giovanni Francesco Busenello...
and Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patriaIl ritorno d'Ulisse in patriaIl ritorno d'Ulisse in patria is an opera in a prologue and five acts , set by Claudio Monteverdi to a libretto by Giacomo Badoaro. The opera was first performed at the Teatro Santi Giovanni e Paolo in Venice during the 1639–1640 carnival season...
written by Martin Pearlman. - Boston Baroque's European debut, performing Handel's Messiah in KrakówKrakówKraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...
and WarsawWarsawWarsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
, Poland in 2003. - Boston Baroque's tour of the Monteverdi Vespers of 1610 to Walt Disney Concert HallWalt Disney Concert HallThe Walt Disney Concert Hall at 111 South Grand Avenue in Downtown Los Angeles, California is the fourth hall of the Los Angeles Music Center. Bounded by Hope Street, Grand Avenue, 1st and 2nd Streets, it seats 2,265 people and serves as the home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra and the...
in Los Angeles, and the summer music festivals at Ravinia and TanglewoodTanglewoodTanglewood is an estate and music venue in Lenox and Stockbridge, Massachusetts. It is the home of the annual summer Tanglewood Music Festival and the Tanglewood Jazz Festival, and has been the Boston Symphony Orchestra's summer home since 1937. It was the venue of the Berkshire Festival.- History...
in 2004 - First professional Boston performances of Luigi CherubiniLuigi CherubiniLuigi Cherubini was an Italian composer who spent most of his working life in France. His most significant compositions are operas and sacred music. Beethoven regarded Cherubini as the greatest of his contemporaries....
's Requiem in C minor in 2005, a neglected work highly praised by leading composers of the day and favorably compared with Mozart's RequiemRequiem (Mozart)The Requiem Mass in D minor by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was composed in Vienna in 1791 and left unfinished at the composer's death. A completion by Franz Xaver Süssmayr was delivered to Count Franz von Walsegg, who had anonymously commissioned the piece for a requiem Mass to commemorate the...
.
Notable recordings
Boston Baroque has performed and recorded period-instrument performances of Bach's Brandenburg ConcertosBrandenburg concertos
The Brandenburg concertos by Johann Sebastian Bach are a collection of six instrumental works presented by Bach to Christian Ludwig, margrave of Brandenburg-Schwedt, in 1721 . They are widely regarded as among the finest musical compositions of the Baroque era...
, Handel's Messiah, Purcell's Dido and Æneas, Monteverdi Vespers of 1610, Bach's Mass in B minor, Handel's Concerti Grossi, Op. 6, Gluck's Iphigénie en Tauride
Iphigénie en Tauride
Iphigénie en Tauride is an opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck in four acts. It was his fifth opera for the French stage. The libretto was written by Nicolas-François Guillard....
, Mozart's The Impresario and Mozart's Circle's The Beneficent Dervish, Handel's Music for Royal Fireworks and Water Music
Water Music (Handel)
The Water Music is a collection of orchestral movements, often considered three suites, composed by George Frideric Handel. It premiered on 17 July 1717 after King George I had requested a concert on the River Thames...
, Bach: The Complete Orchestral Suites, Mozart: Flute Concertos and Symphony No. 41
Symphony No. 41 (Mozart)
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart completed his Symphony No. 41 in C major, K. 551, on 10 August 1788. It was the last symphony that he composed.The work is nicknamed the Jupiter Symphony...
"Jupiter", Vivaldi's Gloria, Bach's Magnificat, Cherubini's Requiem in C minor (1816) and March funèbre (1820), Beethoven's Elegiac Song (Elegischer Gesang
Elegischer Gesang
Elegischer Gesang , Op. 118, is a work by Ludwig van Beethoven, which is scored for string quartet and four voices. The work furthers Beethoven's late infatuation with the genre of the string quartet. It is one of Beethoven's least known works and is not performed or recorded very often.-External...
), Op. 118.
Boston Baroque has received three Grammy Nominations
- Handel’s Messiah, 1992: Best Performance of a Choral Work
- Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, 1998: Best Performance of a Choral Work
- Bach’s Mass in B Minor, 2000: Best Performance of a Choral Work
Notable premiere recordings by Boston Baroque include:
- First period instrument recording of Mozart's Requiem Mass in D minor in the completion by Robert D. LevinRobert D. LevinRobert D. Levin is a classical performer, musicologist, and composer, and is the Artistic Director of the Sarasota Music Festival.-Education:...
, in which Levin addresses the issues of instrumentation, grammar and structure raised by the traditional Sussmayr completion. - Lost Music of Early America, the first and sole professional CD recording of American Moravian Church music—the first early American classical music. Martin Pearlman researched the music at the Moravian Music Foundation in Salem, North Carolina, and chose and arranged the hymns into patterns appropriate for the Moravian LovefeastLovefeastA Lovefeast service is a service dedicated to Christian love, and is most famously practiced by the Moravians but also by groups descending from the Schwarzenau Brethren...
or Liebesmahl, primarily a song service with hymns, psalms and anthems. Included are Lovefeasts for Christmas, Lent and Thanksgiving. - The Philosopher's Stone, (Der Stein der Weisen), 1790, a collaboratively composed Singspiel with a story based on the same set of fairy-tales from which The Magic Flute was drawn, which attracted renewed attention in 1996, when musicologist David J. Buch discovered a previously unknown copy. Besides numerous correlations with Mozart’s final operatic work, The Magic Flute, which was written for the same company a year later, this copy of The Philosopher’s Stone suggested the likelihood of Mozart's participation in the composition of more of the music than had been previously thought. Boston Baroque was chosen by David J. Buch to give the modern-day world premiere of The Philosopher's Stone. The work was presented in concert form in Boston's Jordan HallJordan HallJordan Hall is a 1,019-seat concert hall in Boston, Massachusetts, the principal performance space of the New England Conservatory. It is one block from Boston's Symphony Hall, and together they are considered two of America's most acoustically perfect performance spaces...
(1999) and recorded for Telarc. - First period instrument recording of Luigi CherubiniLuigi CherubiniLuigi Cherubini was an Italian composer who spent most of his working life in France. His most significant compositions are operas and sacred music. Beethoven regarded Cherubini as the greatest of his contemporaries....
's long neglected Requiem in C minor, which premiered on January 21, 1817, in a memorial concert below the abbey church of St. Denis to commemorate the anniversary of the executions of Louis XVI and Marie AntoinetteMarie AntoinetteMarie Antoinette ; 2 November 1755 – 16 October 1793) was an Archduchess of Austria and the Queen of France and of Navarre. She was the fifteenth and penultimate child of Holy Roman Empress Maria Theresa and Holy Roman Emperor Francis I....
. Though held in the highest esteem by Beethoven, Brahms, Berlioz and Wagner, and performed widely in its own day, the piece fell into obscurity along with most of Cherubini's output by the end of the 19th century.
Collaborations
- Boston Baroque performed with Mark MorrisMark MorrisMark William Morris is an American dancer, choreographer and director whose work is acclaimed for its craftsmanship, ingenuity, humor, and at times eclectic musical accompaniments...
and the Mark Morris Dance Group in five performances of Henry PurcellHenry PurcellHenry Purcell – 21 November 1695), was an English organist and Baroque composer of secular and sacred music. Although Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements into his compositions, his legacy was a uniquely English form of Baroque music...
's Dido and Æneas, in Chicago and Ann Arbor, in 1996. - Boston Baroque performed Boston's first fully staged production of AlcesteAlceste (Gluck)Alceste is an opera by Christoph Willibald Gluck from 1767. The libretto was written by Ranieri de' Calzabigi and based on the play Alcestis by Euripides. The premiere took place in Vienna.-Preface and reforms:...
by Christoph Willibald GluckChristoph Willibald GluckChristoph Willibald Ritter von Gluck was an opera composer of the early classical period. After many years at the Habsburg court at Vienna, Gluck brought about the practical reform of opera's dramaturgical practices that many intellectuals had been campaigning for over the years...
in a co-production with Opera BostonOpera BostonOpera Boston is an opera company in Boston, Massachusetts. It specializes in innovative repertoire and rarely heard works, along with opera education and outreach programs designed to bring opera education to children, in schools and after-school programs throughout the Boston area.Its home base is...
at the Cutler Majestic Theatre in 2005 - Boston Baroque performed Handel's Semele, in a fully staged production with Opera Boston at the Cutler Majestic Theatre in February 2008.