Italian Baroque concert May 31 at St. Alban Episcopal Church

Peter Lekx, Paula Maust and Malina Rauschenfels perform at St. Alban.

Experience the passion and tyranny of unrequited love in the 18th-century, when Burning River Baroque presents “Obsession & Unrequited Love” on Saturday, May 31, at 8 p.m., at St. Alban Episcopal Church (2555 Euclid Heights Blvd., Cleveland Heights).

The program comprises Italian cantatas by Giovanni Bononcini, Nicola Porpora and Domenico Scarlatti, rivaled in drama and virtuosity by the violin and cello sonatas of Porpora, Scarlatti and Francesco Maria Veracini that are also part of the concert. Though these Italian Baroque composers are perhaps not as familiar to modern audience as their contemporaries J.S. Bach and G.F. Handel, in their own day they were revered as some of the brightest stars in the musical world.

Each piece exemplifies the shift toward a new style of composition that took place in the first half of the 18th century. The compositions favor melody and fast-paced drama over the highly contrapuntal single-affekt style of earlier works.

Burning River Baroque is a Cleveland-based organization that was founded in 2012 to present Baroque music in this region and around the country. This concert’s performers include its founders, Peter Lekx, baroque violin, and Malina Rauschenfels, soprano and baroque cello; along with Matt Zucker, baroque cello, and Paula Maust, harpsichord.

Admission is by freewill donation; seating reservations are available online at www.burningriverbaroque.org.

Malina Rauschenfels

Malina Rauschenfels, executive director of Burning River Baroque, is a soprano, composer and multi-instrumentalist transplanted to Cleveland after 11 years in New York City.

 

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Volume 7, Issue 6, Posted 9:34 AM, 05.27.2014