Tage Alter Musik – Almanach 2018

6 Seventeen concerts of early music in just four days is the promise of the Regensburg Tage Alter Musik festival. It is held annually over the Pentecost/Whitsun weekend, along- side non-musical Regensburg celebrations, including a beer festival and fairground that brings the local youth out in their distinctive Bavarian outfits. Tage Alter Musik takes place within the architectural and historic delights of this beautiful city on the Danube – the en- tire city centre is a World Heritage site. Ven- ues for the concerts include austere Gothic, glittering Baroque/Rococo, and the historic Reichssaal in the Altes Rathaus, for centuries the permanent seat of the Parliament of the Holy Roman Empire. The weekend runs from Friday evening, with two concerts, fol- lowed by five concerts on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, the latter including a concert that started at 00:15 in the morning! Friday 18 May The festival traditionally opens with the choir of Regensburg Cathedral, the regens- burger Domspatzen , on this occasion ac- companied by concerto Köln directed by roland Büchner , in the Dreieinigkeitskirche (Trinity Church), and featuring the music of Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy. They opened with his 1831 setting of the Lutheran prayer, Verleih uns Frieden gnädiglich (based on Da Pacem, Domine) , a beautifully short and simple chorus built on the distinctive sound of two intertwining cellos. The substantial work was the 1840 Lobgesang , described by Mendelssohn as a Symphony-Cantata but posthumously, and with no authority, given the name of Symphony No 2. It was commis- sioned by the City of Leipzig to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the invention of print- ing and is one of Mendelssohn’s most pow- erful works. The extended choral cantata comes after a 25-minute three-movement andrewbensonwilson.org Andrew Benson-Wilson Early Music Reviews Miriam Alexandra, Sopran, Regensburger Domspatzen, Concerto Köln, Leitung: Roland Büchner Tage Alter Musik, Regensburg, 18-21 May 2018 // Autor: Andrew Benson-Wilson