Saturday 27 January, 7:45pm
CLASSICAL
Doors & bar 6:00pm | Concert 7:45pm, ends 9:00pm, no interval
Tickets £24 / £12 (under 25)
Emily Baines, recorders | Jim O’Toole, Holly Harman, violins | Alexis Bennett, viola | Poppy Walshaw, baroque cello | Katie De La Matter, harpsichord, organ | Arngeir Hauksson, theorbo, baroque guitar
George Frideric Handel - Overture from ‘The Famous Water Piece’, Dead March from Saul, See the Conquering Hero Comes
Anon - Mr. Reddin’s Ground
Handel - Minuet from Ariadne, Alla Fama from Ottone, Overture from Scipio, Organ concerto no 5 in F
Jacques Hotteterre - L’amour, le seul amour, L’autre jour ma Chloris
Trad. - The Lass of Patie’s Mill
Francesco Geminiani - Auld Bob Maurice
Samuel Arnold - The Favorite March in Purcell’s Bonduca
Anon - God Save the King
Thomas Arne - Rule Britannia
Handel - Overture and Lascia Ch’io Pianga from Rinaldo, Minuet from Rodelinda
John Baston - Recorder Concerto no 6 in D
The Ghost in the Machine brings to life the fascinating and effervescent performance style preserved in 18th century mechanical musical instruments. The repertoire is based on music played by period barrel organs or miniature organs within clocks, collected and researched by Emily Baines over a 10 year period.
Two such instruments were especially prominent - the Braamcamp musical clock, made by Charles Clay, featured music by Handel, Corelli and Geminiani with clock tune arrangements that link directly back to Handel himself; and a barrel organ built by Henry Holland around 1790, has 12 barrels of music, more than half of it by Handel. The music from the Holland barrel organ, played by the full ensemble in this concert, is particularly elaborate and ornamental (a far cry from 'mechanical'), reflecting the Baroque improvisatory style of Handel. A suite of three short Handel pieces (played on recorder and organ alone) are transcriptions from the organ inside Charles Clay’s musical clock, and is the closest we get to the sound of the real mechanical musical machine.
Emily Baines is a specialist recorder player and a highly skilled multi-instrumentalist performing worldwide on shawms, bagpipes and other early reed instruments. She is joined in Amyas by specialists in historically-informed performance, with many leading the way in cutting-edge research into earlier practices. The group are renowned for their exuberant performances and their passion for discovering unknown early sources.