J. J. Ryba: Stabat Mater

One of the world’s best early music ensembles making its festival debut with an exploratory programme from the Czech archives.

“They make a marvellously incisive sound, so thrilling,” wrote a critic for BBC Music Magazine in a review of a performance given by the Helsinki Baroque Orchestra. Another representative of the remarkable Finnish school of music, the group has been active on the scene for over a quarter of a century and, during this time, has evolved into one of the world’s finest ensembles dedicated to the historically informed interpretation of early music. Since 2003 they have been headed by Aapo Häkkinen, a laureate of the celebrated harpsichord competition in Bruges, who was taught by eminent teachers in Helsinki, Amsterdam and Paris, and whose mentor was the legendary organist, harpsichordist and conductor, Gustav Leonhardt. Accompanied by five outstanding singers and the Purcell Choir from Budapest, the orchestra is appearing at the Prague Spring for the first time to perform two masterful sacred works associated with the Czech Lands in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. The programme comprises the modern premiere of the oratorio La Purificazione di Maria Virgine (The Purification of the Virgin Mary) from 1807 by Antonio Casimir Cartellieri, second Kapellmeister at the court of Prince Joseph Franz Maximilian Lobkowitz, and Stabat Mater from 1805 by Jakub Jan Ryba, famous as the author of the Czech Christmas Mass.

Tickets: 450 – 1 200 CZK