Friday, September 21, 8 p.m.
Cathedral
OPENING
CROATIAN BAROQUE ENSEMBLE
Laura Vadjon, leader
Tanja Tortic,Helga Korbar i Urban Jerman, violins
Tadesse, viola
Stjepan Nodilo, oboe
Lea Sušanj Lujo, cello
Fran Petrač, double bass
SOLOISTS OF ORCHESTRA LIBERA CLASSICA
Natsumi Wakamatsu, Kaori Toda, Nao Takahashi, Rieko Ikeda, violins
Hiroshi Narita, viola
Takayuki Kiryu, trumpet
Hiroshi Kaneko, lute
Naoki Ueo, harpsichord
VOCAL ENSEMBLE LA FONTAVERDE
Midori Suzuki, Netsuko Someya, sopranos
Sumihito Uesugi, countertenor
Yosuke Taniguchi, Katsuhiko Nakashima, tenors
Yoshitaka Ogasawara, bass
CHORUS ANGELICUS CHOIR
Anđelko Igrec, choirmaster
Hidemi Suzuki, conductor
Programme:
Georg Philipp Telemann
Tafelmusik vol.2, Suite in D major, TWV:55:D1
Ouverture /Lentement-Vite-Lentement-Vite-Lentement/
Air /Tempo giusto/
Air /Vivace/
Air /Presto/
Air /Allegro/
Antonio Vivaldi
Gloria n D major, RV 589
Gloria in excelsis Deo, chorus
Et in terra pax,chorus
Laudamus te, sopranos I and II
Gratias agimus tibi, chorus
Propter magnam gloriam, chorus
Domine Deus, soprano
Domine, Fili unigenite, chorus
Domine Deus, Agnus Dei, contralto and chorus
Qui tollis peccata mundi, chorus
Qui sedes ad dexteram Patris, contralto
Quoniam tu solus sanctus, chorus
Cum Sancto Spiritu, chorus
About the performer:
Croatian Baroque Ensemble is the most prominent Croatian ensemble specialized inhistorically authentic interpretations of instrumental and vocal-instrumental music from the baroque and similar periods. The ensemble was founded in 1999 and consists of esteemed musicians of a younger generation. Along with a continuous concert cycles in Croatian Music Institute, they are also regular guests at numerous national and international festivals (Varaždin Baroque Evenings, Dubrovnik Summer Festival, Split Summer Festival, Korkyra Baroque Festival, Osor Musical Evenings, Musical Evenings in St. Donat, Histria festival, Croatian Passion Heritage, Organum Histriae, Concerts in Euphrasiana, Rovinj Summer Music Festival, Brod Musical Summer, Osijek Summer of Culture, Pag Cultural Summer, SEVICQ Brežice Festival, Festival of Croatian Music in Wiena, Esteban Salas Festivl (Havana – Cuba), International Baroque Festival Melk, Misiones de Chiquitos Festival (Bolivia), International Festival of Sacred Music in Rome, Festival Tesori musicali Toscani – Pisa and others).
In their concert programs, the ensemble often hosts prominent international and Croatian soloists and conductors, experts with an authentic approach in performing baroque music (Enrico Onofri, Adrian Butterfield, Laurence Cummings, Richard Egarr, Hervé Niquet, Stefano Montanari, Philip Pickett, Catherine Mackintosh, Werner Ehrhardt, Ryo Terakado, Aapo Häkkinnen, Richard Egarr, Peter Lönnerberg, Mimi Mitchell, David Staff, Theresa Caudle, Enrico Onofri, Alessandro Tampieri, Rachel Brown, Adrian Butterfield, Stefano Montanari, Marcello Gatti, Jaap ter Linden, Jacques Ogg). Croatian Society of Musical Artists gave Croatian Baroque Ensemble the Milka Trnina Award in 2002. Dubrovnik Summer Festival gave them the Orlando Award for their performance in 2014. Except in Croatia, the ensemble performed in Austria, Italy, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Sweden, Finland, Argentina, Cuba, Bolivia, Estonia, France, Montenegro, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Slovenia.
Japanese Orchestra Libera Classica is specialized in music from the 18th century, performed on authentic instruments or their replicas. Prominent Japanese cellist and conductor, Hidemi Suzuki, founded it in 2001; in May 2002, they started working. Now it has more than 30 members, who work not only in Japan but also in many European ensembles like Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century or Les Arts Florissants and others. The orchestra regularly performs in Tokio in Hamarikyu Asahi Hall – TDK Arte dell’arco usually records and publishes those concerts. Orchestra Libera Classic’s specialties are the works of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Joseph Haydn, and their performances, according to numerous critics, are characterized by great expressiveness and a new interpretative approach.
Vocal ensemble La Fontaverde is founded in 2002, by a respectable Japanese soprano, Midori Suzuki. The ensemble is specialized in performing renaissance and early baroque music, especially madrigals. Members of the ensemble – Midori Suzuki, Netsuko Someya Sumihito Uesugi, Yousuke Taniguchi, Katsuhiko Nakashima, Yoshitaka Ogasawara – have all been educated in Japan as well as at the European university centers for early music. Each of them has their own solo carrier, but the members also perform as chamber, concert and opera musicians, being a part of prominent ensemble’s projects, such as Bach Collegium Japan, Collegium Vocale Gent, La Primavera, Le Petit Band etc.
Chorus angelicus is a choir from Varaždin dedicated to performing pieces of Croatian and world musical heritage. Maestro Anđelko Igrec founded it in 1999 and now it consists of forty dedicated singers of all age. Its greatest strength, Chorus angelicus had shown on big and demanding projects – performance of complete masterpieces of world music heritage like G.F. Handel’s Messiah, J. S. Bach’s St John Passion, J. Haydn’s The Creation and C. Monteverdi’s Vespro della Beata Maria. As a result, the choir won Ivan Lukačić Award in 2016 for their performance of St John Passion by J. S. Bach, within Varaždin Baroque Evenings. The choir has held many concerts, mostly in Varaždin and its surroundings, but also in other parts of Croatia and abroad (they held international tours in Austria, Hungary, Israel). Thanks to projects of Varaždin Baroque Evenings, the choir collaborated with a number of Croatian and international ensembles specialized for baroque music. Some of them are Le Parlement de Musique from Strasbourg, Hofkapelle from München, Musica Coeli from Graz, Pratum Integrum from Moscow, Accademia Bizantina from Ravenna, Sonatores Panoniae from Hungary, Varaždin Chamber Orchestra, Croatian Baroque Ensemble and Camerata Garestin from Croatia. Although they have mostly baroque compositors on their repertoire, Chorus angelicus choir perform works from other periods as well – renaissance, classicism, romanticism and contemporary composers (Rutter, Ramirez, Orff, Igrec). Some of the performances are recorded on CDs (Mozart’s Requiem, musical Christmas in Varaždin Cathedral, Bach’s St John Passion, Igrec’s Songs of Worship and Praise). Within the project Ruksak pun kulture implemented by the Ministry of Culture, the member of the choir meet the young generations with some compositors, works of classical music and periods of their occurrence through educational visits to schools throughout Croatia.
Hidemi Suzuki took his music degrees at the Toho Gakuen School of Music in Tokyo, with a focus on cello and conducting. After a successful career as a modern cellist, he went to the Netherlands in 1984 to study Baroque cello with the Dutch period-instrument pioneer Anner Bylsma. Suzuki won first prize at the First International Baroque Cello Competition in Paris in 1986. He was a member of the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century under Frans Brüggen from 1985-1993, then principal cellist of La Petite Bande with Sigiswald Kuijken between 1992 and 2001. He was professor of Baroque Cello at the Royal Conservatory of Brussels from 1994 to 2000. His students have included Antje Geusen, Christoph Theinert Tormod Dalen, and Mime Yamahiro.
In 2001, Suzuki returned to Japan, where he serves on the faculty of Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music. In 2001, he founded and became conductor of Orchestra Libera Classica, a period-instrument group focused on Haydn and the classical era. He is a member of the Bach Collegium Japan, the Boccherini Quartet Tokyo, and the quartet, Mito dell’Arco. He worked with the Mexican bowmaker Luis Emilio Rodriguez on the reconstruction of historically accurate bow construction methods.
Suzuki was the first Japanese cellist, who recorded the Six Cello Suites by Johann Sebastian Bach on a period instrument, in 1995; it was awarded an Artistic Creation Prize by Japan’s Agency for Cultural Affairs that year. He won a Diapason d’Or in France for his recording of early works of Ludwig von Beethoven; his recording of the cello concertos of Haydn’s concerti with La Petite Bande won the Record Academy Award in Japan. He has also recorded the cello sonatas by Francesco Geminiani, the cello concertos of Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach with the Bach Collegium Japan, and chamber music of George Friderich Händel.