Night Music charms its audiences with music of the Revolutionary and Romantic eras, performing music of Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and beyond on instruments of the time. Founded in 2015, Night Music presents its second concert series in Philadelphia in 2016-17 under the direction of Heather Miller Lardin.
THE FANTASTIC MR. TELEMANN
Thursday, October 12, 2017
7:30pm
Powel House
Musical improvisation and pre-planned, notated music that simulated improvisation remained in vogue throughout the eighteenth century. The main locus of improvisatory style was the fantasia, a genre epitomized by Telemann’s solo instrumental works for solo flute, violin, and viola da gamba and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach’s keyboard works. Our program is built around three fantasias: two by Telemann, and one by the younger Bach, who was his godson and namesake. Alternating ensemble pieces bring the solo instruments in dialogue with one another and explore the fantasia’s influence on other genres.
With guests Francesca Brittain, fortepiano, Sarah Cunningham, viola da gamba, and Margaret Humphrey, violin
A NIGHT AT THE OPERA
Thursday, April 26, 2018
7:30pm
Powel House
Since its inception, opera’s extravagant sets, over-the-top costumes, and legendary superstars have kept the genre wildly popular. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century music lovers who couldn’t get enough of opera’s expensive thrills brought it into their homes on a smaller scale through arrangements of overtures and arias, operatically-inspired instrumental music, and theatrical cantatas or “Singspiels” such as those on our program by Michael Haydn (Der Bassgeiger du Wörgl) and Thomas Arne (The Morning). We also introduce our own arrangement of Mozart’s concert aria “Per questa bella mano” for bass and obbligato double bass.
With guest singers Laura Heimes and Graham Bier