Handel in affect

THE PRESENT feels chaotic. Now it is time to put things in order. Within the safe setting of a workshop, eight sensitive characters are brought together to engage in practical exercises: by means of the Handelian Da Capo aria, emotions are to be explored through examples and guided into structured channels. The theories of Johann Mattheson, Athanasius Kircher and René Descartes serve as a seemingly solid academic foundation. But can this work? - With specially arranged arias from operas, oratorios and cantatas by George Frideric Handel as well as music by Luciano Berio, Lucia Ronchetti, Georges Aperghis and Cathy Berberian, the ensemble delves into a world of alternating affects.

Programme

Luciano Berio: Sequenza III
Georg Friedrich Händel: Ouverture from Music for the Royal Fireworks (HWV 351)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Ouverture from Music for the Royal Fireworks (HWV 351)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Scherza in mar la navicella from Lotario (HWV 26)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Conosco che mi piace from Clori, Tirsi e Fileno (HWV 96)
Steve Reich: Clapping Music
Georg Friedrich Händel: Sibilar gli angui d’Aletto from Rinaldo (HWV 7a)
Georges Aperghis: Récitation Nr. 9
Georg Friedrich Händel: Happy we! from Acis und Galatea (HWV 49a)
Lucia Ronchetti: Szene from Albertine
Georg Friedrich Händel: Priva son d’ogni conforto from Giulio Cesare in Egitto (HWV 17)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Nel riposo fromDeidamia (HWV 42)
Cathy Berberian: Stripsody
Georg Friedrich Händel: Furie terribili from Rinaldo (HWV 7a)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Destructive war, thy limits know from Belshazzar (HWV 61)
Georg Friedrich Händel: Tu del ciel ministro eletto from Il Trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno (HWV 46a)