Featuring:

About this Program

We are thrilled to once again return to the pied autumn beauty at Holy Wisdom Monastery for our season-opening concerts! Also returning is internationally renowned Baroque violinist Marc Destrubé—after Vivaldi’s Venice concerts in 2023 and the stunning French Baroque Style in 2024—to lead this dazzling program of Classical Symphonies. Keep in mind that in the mid-18th century, symphonies were viewed as a cutting-edge, experimental genre, and one of the crazy things composers did was bring natural (valveless) horns—used outdoors for centuries to communicate over great distances, particularly during the hunt—right into the concert hall! In this concert, the chamber orchestra will sport a pair of natural horns with their sylvan and spacious timbre.

We’ve outlined the emotional range of this program as: Storm & Stress … Sunny Lyricism… the Daring Turn. Featured are two of Haydn’s most tempestuous, proto-Romantic works in the Sturm und Drang (Storm and Stress) style which he cultivated during the 1760s and early 1770s. Note how his 1771 Symphony No. 52 in C minor, which closes our program, prefigures Beethoven’s iconic 5th Symphony written 37 years later, in 1808, in the same key! We’ll hear from Luigi Boccherini, virtuoso cellist and prolific composer of string quintets and symphonies, whose genuine Italian Sunny Lyricism in this Symphony in A major is simply irrepressible. And from Carl Philipp Emmanuel Bach—J. S. Bach’s son, often credited with breaking from Baroque aesthetics and ushering in the Classical style—the bold Symphony in E-flat major. Through his inspired and Daring Turns of phrase, C.P.E. kept his audiences on the edge of their seats—our seat edges are ready!

Marc Destrubé is a member of the Axelrod String Quartet—quartet-in-residence at the Smithsonian Institution—and is currently the concertmaster of the Oregon Bach Festival. He was concertmaster of the Orchestra of the 18th Century and the CBC Radio Orchestra and has played as concertmaster under Sir Simon Rattle, Kent Nagano, Helmuth Rilling, Christopher Hogwood, Philippe Herreweghe, Gustav Leonhardt, and Frans Brügge.

Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805)—Symphony in A major, G. 511, Op. 1 No. 3
C.P.E. Bach (1714-1788)—Symphony in E-flat major, Wq. 179 (H. 654)
Joseph Haydn (1732-1809)—Symphony No. 49 in F minor, Hob. I:49 (“La Passione”); Symphony No. 52 in C minor, Hob. I:52

Other Events