The Oxford 'Early Music by Candlelight' Summer Festival 2024
7.30pm 7 July — 25 August 2024
Exeter College Chapel, Turl Street, Oxford University OX1 3DP
Charivari Agréable's annual summer festival is the highlight of Oxford's cultural cornucopia
'Every series consists of six or so different programmes, repeated several times each. Ng picks pieces to fit a theme, and then chooses ensembles from among his enormous pool of talented musicians, with readings or introductions which tie the pieces together. They're laid back and professional, irreverent yet learned, and make for an evening that's both calm and stimulating. It is a pleasing irony that these concerts are Oxford institutions, organised by someone with such an international background: Ng was born in Malaysia and came to Oxford by way of Melbourne and Frankfurt.' — Daily Info Oxford
Please scroll down for programme synopses/details and links to tickets
Game of Queens
Machiavellian Machinations & Survival Strategies
An enthralling narrative of Mary Queen of Scots, Elizabeth I & Catherine de' Medici which includes assassinations, poison, the occult, religious wars and massacres, and (in Catherine's own words) 'passion, hatred, and vengeance', illustrated with music (by Attaignant, Arbeau, Bataille, Caccini, Dowland, Guedron, Strozzi), readings from contemporary correspondence, as well as the sonnets and speeches of W. Shakespeare.
Charivari Agréable
Isobel Collyer—reader & soprano
Layil Barr—recorders & bass viol
Kah-Ming Ng—virginals
Game of Queens £17, £16 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
Hausmusik des Barock
Virtuosic chamber music of the Age of Enlightenment
Vivaldi, Bach, Heinichen, Handel, Fasch, Telemann & Zelenka
Charivari Agréable
Nicola Barbagli—baroque oboe & recorder
Matthew Lewis—baroque bassoon
Edmund Taylor—baroque violin
Kah-Ming Ng—harpsichord
Hausmusik: £18, £17 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
Sonnerie et Carillons
Cross-channel confabulation between the sonorous yet uncommon pair of
gut-string instruments of antipodal heritages
Matthew Locke: Consort of Two Parts for several Friends
Henry Butler: Triosonata #19 in G major
Henry Purcell: Triosonata for Violin, Bass Viol and Thorough-bass Z.780
Jean-Philippe Rameau: 4eme Pièces de clavecin en concert
Louis Couperin: Les Carillons de Paris
Marin Marais: Tombeau pour Monsieur de Lully; Sonnerie de Ste Genevieve du Mont de Paris
Charivari Agréable
May Robertson—baroque violin
Sarah Small—viola da gamba
Kah-Ming Ng—harpsichord
Sonnerie: £17, £16 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
Le Roi Danse
Courtly dance music inspired by Louis XIV, the dancing king who initiated the development of dance notation and founded the world's first ballet school.
Jean-Baptiste Lully: Passacaille d'Armide & Chaconne de Phaeton
Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Prélude & Passacaille from Le Concert pour quatre parties
Henry Purcell: Chacony
Johann Joseph Fux: Ciaccona
George Frideric Handel: Overture & Passacaille op.5/4
Jean-Philippe Rameau: dances from Les Indes Galantes & Dardanus
Charivari Agréable
Edmund Taylor & Hannah Parry—baroque violin
William Anderson—baroque viola
Kate Conway— baroque cello
dir. Kah-Ming Ng—harpsichord
Le Roi Danse: £20, £19 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
The Two Sibyllas
The story of two young widows, both Duchesses of Württemberg named
Sibylla, who played crucial roles in supporting the musical careers of two giants of the Middle Baroque, Froberger & Pachelbel. Also music by L. Couperin, Purcell, Balbastre, and Duphly.
A candlelit harpsichord recital by Kah-Ming Ng
'Dazzling display of keyboard prowess'—The Independent
'Undoubted technical virtuosity and intellectual grasp'—Early Music News
Two Sibyllas: £15, £14 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
Hear O Heav'ns
Choral gems from the Reformation to the Restoration:
mass, hymn, metrical psalms, and Chapel Royal verse anthems
William Byrd: Mass for four voices
William Mundy: O Lord, the maker of all thing
John Blow: Who shall separate us — O be joyful in the Lord, all ye lands
Pelham Humfrey: Hear O heav’ns — Have mercy upon me
William Lawes: The lamentation of a sinner
Henry Purcell: O God, the King of Glory
Charivari Agréable
Olwen Lintern Smyth—soprano
Sam Mitchell & Julian Hartley—countertenor
Colin Danskin—tenor
Benjamin Watkins—bass
dir. Kah-Ming Ng—chamber organ
Hear O Heav'ns: £20, £19 (seniors), £10 (students <25)
Tickets in June from The Oxford Playhouse, Beaumont Street OX1 2LW, Tel: 01865-305305,
or at the door (cash only)