Wigmore Hall 125: Jordi Savall and Hespèrion XXI

As part of Wigmore Hall's 125th Anniversary Festival, the early music specialist Jordi Savall presents a specially recorded concert of music by Monteverdi and his contemporaries. Jordi Savall and Hespèrion XXI have been an important part of the early music world for over half a century. Their festive concert places instrumental consort pieces from Elizabethan and Jacobean England together with pioneering compositions from the aristocratic courts of Italy and Germany, culminating in a performance of Monteverdi's stylised pastoral drama about the lovers Tirsi and Clori.

Also in today's Classical Live, Mark Forrest introduces a recent performance from Salzburg from today's featured conductor, Finnish musician Klaus Mäkelä, of powerful music by Mahler: the 5th Symphony, which includes the celebrated Adagietto, written as love letter to his wife Alma; and there's more from star harpsichordist Jean Rondeau in France, with his own take on keyboard music from the French Baroque.

WIGMORE HALL – 125

'THE TEARS AND FIRE OF THE MUSES, CLAUDIO MONTEVERDI REVOLUTION’

Jordi Savall (viola da gamba/director)
Hespèrion XXI
Soloists of La Capella Reial de Catalunya

Samuel Scheidt: Paduan V / Courant Dolorosa IX
Claudio Monteverdi: Lamento d’Arianna
John Dowland: Lachrimae Antiquae
Anthony Holborne: The Teares of the Muses
Claudio Monteverdi: Sestina: Lagrime d’amante al sepolcro dell’amata
John Dowland: Lachrimae Gementes / The Earl of Essex Galliard
Claudio Monteverdi: Qui rise, o Tirsi
John Dowland: Semper Dowland semper dolens
Giacomo Gorzanis: La barca d'amore
Claudio Monteverdi: Tirsi e Clori

Introduced by Martin Handley

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Presented by Mark Forrest

Gustav Mahler
Symphony No. 5 in C# minor
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Klaus Mäkelä (conductor)

François Couperin
Improvisation on Prelude in C (from 'L’Art de toucher le clavecin’)
Jean Rondeau (harpsichord)