Europa Galante, Fabio Biondi, direction & violinFounded in 1989, by its artistic director Fabio Biondi, Europa Galante quickly acquired international fame, becoming a symbol of the rebirth of baroque music in Italy. From their very first recording, Europa Galante conquered audiences world-wide with its revolutionary approach and their free and impassioned playing of Italian music. Their recordings have won some of the most prestigious awards: Gramophone Award, Grammy Nominations, Echo Classics, Grand Prix du Disque de l'Académie Charles Cros, Vivaldi Prize - Fondazione Giorgio Cini, 4 Diapason d'Or de l'Année, Prix RTL, ffff Télérama, 10 de Répertoire...
The ensemble performs in the world's major concert halls: the Berlin Philharmonic, The Library of Congress in Washington, Lincoln Center in New York, the Théâtre de la Ville and Théâtre des Champs Elysées in Paris, the Wigmore Hall and Royal Albert Hall in London, Teatro alla Scala in Milan, Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, Suntory Hall in Tokyo, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Musikverein in Vienna, Sydney Opera House, and the international festivals of San Sebastian, Costa Verde, Monaco Printemps des Arts, Baalbeck, London Proms, St Denis, Ambronay, the 'Folle Journée' in Nantes and Tokyo, Festival de La Chaise Dieu and on several occasions in the Festival de Radio France Montpellier. They have toured Canada, Japan, Australia, North and South America, appear regularly throughout Europe and have been invited to the Kraków Misteria Paschalia and Opera Rara festivals every year since 2006.
Europa Galante performs programmes of instrumental and vocal works from the 17th and 18th Centuries, ranging from chamber concerts to oratorio programmes and the operas of Handel and Vivaldi, with such major artists as Ian Bostridge, David Daniels, Patricia Petibon, Nathalie Dessay, Vivica Genaux and Roberta Invernizzi. The ensemble has extensively explored the works of Alessandro Scarlatti, both his Oratorios - La Maddelena, La Santissima Trinità, La Santissima Annunziata, Humanità e Lucifero, Caino..., his Serenades - Clori, Dorino e Amore, and his operas - Massimo Puppieno, Il Trionfo dell'Onore, La Principessa Fedele, Carlo Re d'Allemagna. Europa Galante is also resident ensemble at Rome's Santa Cecilia where they have given several modern world première performances of 18th Century oratorios such as Leonardo Leo's Sant'Elena al Calvario, Antonio Caldara's La Passione di Gesú Cristo, and Francesco di Mayo's Gesú sotto il peso della Croce.
In 1998, after a long collaboration with the label Opus 111, Europa Galante signed an exclusive recording contract with Virgin Classics. Their recordings - Vivaldi's L'Estro Armonico, Airs & Cantatas by J. S. Bach with the English tenor, Ian Bostridge,Vivaldi's Concerti con Titoli and Il cimento dell'armonia e dell'inventione, based on original manuscripts, as well as Boccherini's String Quintets, have all been widely acclaimed in the international press. Their most recent Virgin Classics release, a Vivaldi aria recording with Vivica Genaux in 2011, was awarded the German Echo Classics Prize. The same year the ensemble was nominated for a Grammy Award for their recording of Vivaldi's opera Ercole sul Termodonte, and this following Grammy nominations for Vivaldi's Bajazet in 2006 and Concerti con molti strumenti in 2004. They have recently recorded Vivaldi's opera L'Oracolo in Messenia, also for Virgin Classics.
Europa Galante has recently embarked on a new recording partnership with the French label Agogique. Their first albim, Suite and concertos by G. P. Telemann, will be released in 2012.
During the 2011-2012 season Europa Galante tours extensively in Europe - Italy, France, Spain, Germany and Poland. They also tour Korea with the English tenor Ian Bostridge, and America with Vivica Genaux including concerts in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Tucson, Denver, Princeton, Atlanta, Las Vegas, Boston and New York's Carnegie Hall. The ensemble will inaugurate the Wurzburg Mozart Festival in June 2012. Their 2011-2012 programmes include Pergolesi's Oratorio La Fenice sul rogo, his opera Lo Frate 'nnamorato, the first modern performances of Vivaldi's L'Oracolo in Messenia in Austria, France and Poland, as well as Bellini's La Norma in Spain.
In the 2012-2013 season, in addition to their numerous European engagements, Europa Galante returns to tour the United States as well as Mexico, Equador and Colombia in South America. Other major events during the season include a performance of Ariosti's opera La Fede nei Tradimenti in Kraków in December 2012, Handel's Imeneo in the Halle Handel festival in June 2013 and an original and exciting new projet, Geminiani's La Foresta Incantata, an instrumental work performed with the projection of a full length animated film that recounts the action-packed 13th canto of Tasso's Jerusalem Delivered.
Concert schedule and further information at www.europagalante.com
April 2012
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Programmes 2013-2014'Adriano in Siria' - Francesco Maria Veracini
[Krakow, 12 December 2013, Vienna, 18 January 2014]
Europa Galante - Fabio Biondi, direction & violin
Dramma per musica in 3 atti
Libretto - Pietro Metastasio (adapted by Angelo Cori)
Cast (tbc - with the singers of the first performance in brackets) :
ADRIANO (Senesino) - alto - Sonia Prina
FARNASPE (Farinelli) - mezzosoprano - Ann Hallenberg
EMIRENA (F. Cuzzoni) - soprano - Roberta Invernizzi
SABINA (F. Bertolli) - alto - Romina Basso
IDALMA (Santini) - mezzosoprano - Lucia Cirillo
OSROA (Montagnana) - baritone - Ugo Guagliardo
Europa Galante - strings, 2 traversos, 2 oboes, 2 horns, 2 trumpets, continuo (tbc)
'Adriano in Siria' was first performed in London in 1735. This was the first of Veracini's operas in London, put on with his Italian friends by 'Opera of the Nobility' in an attempt to break Handel's hegemony there - Handel put on both Ariodante and Alcina in the same year.
The score of 'Adriano in Siria' has been prepared from an unpublished manuscript in the Henry Watson Library, Manchester, by the German musicologist Holger Schmitt-Hallenberg. The recitatives are composed by Fabio Biondi.
ARGUMENT (Angelo Cori, 1735)
Adrian having conquered the Parthians, was raised to the Throne while he was at Antioch; where, notwithstanding, he was (in Rome) engaged to marry Sabina, Niece of his predecessor; he became enamoured of Emirena, his Capitive Princess, Daughter of the vanquished King, and with great
Earnestness desired the Completion of these Nuptials, under Pretence of its being a necessary band, to establish a lasting Friendship between Asia and Rome; and to that end invited to Antioch the conquered Princes of Asia; particularly Osroa, ather of Emirena. But this barbarous Prince, an
implacable Enemy to the Roman Name, though defeated and without an Home, contemned the Invitation and went o Antioch disguised as an Attendant on Farnaspes, who had been a Tributary Prince to him, whom with Gifts and Entreaties he sollicited to deliver his Captive Daughter, promised before to Farnaspes, that he might have no obstacle to his revenging himself on the new Caesar Adriano.
Sabina, in the Interim, having heard of Adrian's being elected Emperor, and ignorant of his new Passion (for Emirena), flew with Impatience from Rome to meet him in Syria, and to accomplish the desired Nuptials.
The Episode introduces Idalma as another Captive Princess, Friend and Confidant of Emirena; who falling in Love with Adrian, aspires to his Nuptials, and employs all arts which her amorous Passion can suggest, to exasperate Adrian against Sabina and Emirena.
The fluctuating Situation of Adrian, between his love for Emirena and the great obligation which obliged him to return to Sabina; the patient suffering of the latter; the plots o the furious Osroa, which are laid to the charge of the innocent Farnaspes; the Uneasiness of Emirena, one while
on account of her Father Osroa's Danger and at another on that of her Lover's, and the Discovery of the Wiles of the enamoured Idalma, are the Motives, which by Degrees rouze the nodding Virtue of Adrian, who at length gaining a Victory over himself, restores his Enemy to his Kingdom; to his
Rival his Spouse, and pardoning Idalma, restores his Heart to Sabina, and recovers his own Glory.
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'La Foreste enchantée' - Francesco Saverio Geminiani
[February 2014]
Full length animated film
By Fabio Biondi & Davide Livermore
Animation by Marco Fantozzi - Zenit audiovisivi, Turin
Europa Galante
Fabio Biondi, direction & violin
18 musicians - strings 43221 - 2 flutes, 2 horns, theorbo & harpsichord
In 1754, for the Paris performance of ‘La Forest enchantée’, the architect and stage director Giovanni Niccolò Servandoni deployed all the possibilities the lighting, stage machines, sets and perspectives available at the time in an original format of choreographic pantomime with music by Geminiani to illustrate the 13th canto of Tasso's 'Jerusalem Delivered' (La Gerusalemme liberata).
This is a story of magic, armies and an imaginary world that traces the confrontation between Aladin and Godefroi, the exploits of Renaud and the transformations of Armide, a world of myth and fantasy that will speak clearly to present day audiences.
Although there is no 18th Century stage machinery, the audience will nevertheless see dancing before its eyes scenes and images that will drawn it into the veritable enchanted forest of this animated film, thanks to the dramatic art of Fabio Biondi and Davide Livermore and of Livermore's drawings and paintings, bringing to the screen the same powerful emotion of Geminiani's music in an unparallelled performance by Fabio Biondi and Europa Galante.
Three YouTube clips available via these links:
Scena 1
Scena 2
Scena 3
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'Imeneo' - Händel (HWV 41)
[Halle, 12 June 2014 - semi-staged by Davide Livermore]
Opera seria in three acts
Italian libretto adapted from Silvio Stampiglia's 'Imeneo'
First performance at the Lincoln's Inn Fields in London on 22 November 1740. A revised version by Handel was given two concert performances in Dublin on 24 and 31 March 1742. Fabio Biondi is using this revised version of 1742.
Cast (tbc):
Imeneo, Magnus Staveland, baritone
Tirinto, Ann Hallenberg, mezzosoprano
Rosmene, Ditte Andersen, soprano
Clomiri, Maria Espada, soprano
Argenio, Markus Fink, bass
Europa Galante - Fabio Biondi, violin & direction
17 musicians - strings 43221, 2 oboes, bassoon, theorbo & harpsichord
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Antonio Vivaldi – 'La Stravaganza'
Ed. Walsh and Hare – circa 1730
Europa Galante - Fabio Biondi, violin & direction
14 musicians
Although Vivaldi never went to England, his works had great success there where they were published and much performed. In what would now be considered a 'pirate' edition, Handel's publisher, John Walsh, selected 5 of Vivaldi's 12 violin concertos from the 'Stravaganza' collection, adding a sixth concerto, the F major Concerto RV 291 for which this edition is the unique source, to make up a collection that catered for the very English partiality for Concerti Grossi with several instrumental soloists.
Available from 17 - 23 September 2013 and later in the season
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Salve Regina - Pergolesi & the Neapolitan composers
Marina de Liso, mezzo-soprano
Europa Galante, Fabio Biondi, direction & violin
2 violins, viola, cello, violone, harpsichord, theorbo, flute & mandolin.
A first half of instrumental music by Nicolas Conforto, Nicola Antonio Porpora and Adolf Hasse, and in the second half Pergolesi's Salve Regina.
Dates available in October and November 2013
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'Chiara’s diary' - Vivaldi's greatest pupil - A life at the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice
"Chiaretta will certainly be Europe's foremost violinist" wrote Charles de Brosses on the 29th August 1739, after hearing the young orphan, hidden behind the gratings of the church of the Ospedale della Pietà in Venice, perform under the guidance of the great Antonio Vivaldi, communicating such powerful emotion to an unknown, forbidden outside world.
Chiaretta was and still is an emblematic figure of the extraordinary phenomenon of musical talent at the Venetian institution, where she loyally dedicated herself for nearly 40 years to the violin, viola d'amore, the organ and singing. Her playing was of such a high level that it attracted the attention of the foremost local musicians, composing expressly for her.
This musical journey is not only Chiaretta's personal musical journey - she was born in 1718 and still active in 1770 - but the passage from one whole epoch to another, from the Baroque to the Gallant style, as lived out by this remarkable orphan, hidden from the eyes of the world yet present through her artistic voice.
Europa Galante - Fabio Biondi, violin & direction
14 musicians
Giovanni Porta - active at the Pietà from 1726 to 1737
Sinfonia for strings in D major
Antonio Vivaldi - active at the Pietà from 1713 to 1740
Sinfonia for strings in G major 'il Coro delle muse' (1740)
Violin Concerto in B flat major RV 222
Antonio Martinelli - active at the Pietà from 1750 to 1781
Violin Concerto in E major 'dedicato alla S.ra Chiara'
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Antonio Martinelli - active at the Pietà from 1750 to 1781
Concerto for Viola d’amore and strings in D major 'Per la S.ra Chiaretta'
Andrea Bernasconi - active at the Pietà from 1744 to 1753
Sinfonia for strings in D major
Fulgenso Perotti - active at the Pietà from 1759 to 1763
Grave in G minor for violin and bass continuo
Gaetano Latilla - active at the Pietà from 1753 to 1765
Sinfonia for strings in G major (1761)
Available during the summer of 2013 and the 2013-2014 season
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'Corelli e l'Arcadia' - Arcangelo Corelli 1653-1713 - 300th anniversary of his death
Trio Sonatas by Corelli, Geminiani, Scarlatti & Pasquini
Europa Galante
Fabio Biondi & Andrea Rognoni, violin
Maurizio Naddeo, cello
Giangiacomo Pinardi, theorbo
Paola Poncet, harpsichord
Available during the summer of 2013
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Gluck & Mozart
Trio Sonatas & Church Sonatas
Europa Galante
Fabio Biondi & Andrea Rognoni, violin
Maurizio Naddeo, cello
Giangiacomo Pinardi, théorbe
Paola Poncet, organ & harpsichord
Gluck's magnificent but rarely heard trio sonatas in celebration of the 300th anniversary of his birth in 1714, with Mozart's famous church sonatas.
MOZART - Sonata da chiesa in D KV 67
GLUCK - Sonata WQ 53 N°3 in A
MOZART - Sonata da chiesa in B flat KV 68
GLUCK - Sonata WQ 53 N°5 in E flat
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GLUCK - Sonata WQ 53 N°2 in G minor
MOZART - Sonata da chiesa in G KV 241
GLUCK - Sonata WQ 53 N°6 in F major
MOZART - Sonata da chiesa in B flat KV 212
Available during 2014
