As passionate about Baroque and Renaissance music as symphony patrons are about Brahms, the San Francisco Early Music Society begins a new season in good company with three September performances by the multi-instrument, do-all ensembles Catacoustic Consort and Wildcat Viols. (They even have a vocalist.) This year, SFEMS will focus on group sounds coming out of Europe from medieval to modern times.
“We structured this season to celebrate chamber music, which is not so different than what we do; but this year we’re not necessarily featuring any particular soloist,” said SFEMS Executive Director Harvey Malloy. “What we’re doing is bringing some of the most brilliant, innovative, and dynamic chamber ensembles to the stage. It’s a chance to hear really great, dynamic chamber music up close and experience it really as we imagine it might have been heard originally.”
“This concert’s music very much reflects Europe at the time — famine in Russia, war in England (including the unrelated death of Queen Elizabeth I), movement in the Vatican in Italy, civil war in France, and the end of the Golden Age in Spain, not to mention the Thirty Years’ War across the continent — and the surge of art that resulted from it.
“One sees in this music the human spirit thriving and reaching out through artistic expression,” said Catacoustic Consort soloist and instrumentalist Annalisa Pappano. “It really is exquisitely beautiful and moving music. I like to compare the dense, dark textures of this music to rich, flourless chocolate cake: not too sweet, with a hint of spice, and so delicious that all of it has to be consumed with intense reflection over each bite.”
This particular concert focuses on German music and features pieces by Christoph Bernhard, Franz Tunder, Mattias Weckmann, and Samuel Scheidt. But the rest of the season still has a lot of ground to cover.
“Part of what we try to do with our series is bring together a combination of local artists, some of whom are well-known in the Bay Area, some with lots of experience in the Bay Area,” said Malloy. “But by coming onto the SFEMS series they’re able to present programs they might not have been able to present otherwise.”
In addition to highlighting homegrown artists, the season also marks the 35th anniversary of SFEMS and features the Baroque Band, Ensemble Caprice, and Magnificat, as well a concert of gypsy music.
“This is sophisticated, passionate, graceful music that should be accessible. I think it’s accessible to everybody, but we explore a huge range, from medieval [vault] music through the superb concertos of J.S. Bach and, of, course, this wonderful [Heinrich] Schütz’ Christmas Story,” said Malloy. “So, I think if [people] want to hear some of the most creative, passionate, virtuosic performances of early music that show how dynamic and vital the field is, they should come to our season.”