A Venetian coronation mass with Gabrieli Consort & Players in Durham Cathedral

After Friday’s sublime performance of Handel’s L’Allegro, il Penseroso ed il Moderato at the opening concert of 2013 Lufthansa Festival of Baroque Music, I am puzzled why this ravishing masterpiece doesn’t enjoy wider popularity (although it was performed recently at the London Handel Festival).

22 November, St Cecilia’s day, lends itself perfectly to music by two of Britain’s greatest composers. Henry Purcell and Benjamin Britten both wrote pieces to celebrate Cecilia as patron saint of music, and Britten was inspired and enriched by Purcell’s music.

Mendelssohn’s oratorio Elijah, first performed at the Birmingham Town Hall in 1847, was enormously popular in Victorian England. In this sense, the Royal Albert Hall, the grandest of Victorian buildings, is spiritually an ideal venue for this great choral masterpiece.

Leider litt die rekonstruierte Weihnachtsmesse der Gabrieli Players an ein paar „Aufführungskrankheiten“.