The Festival features innovative arrangements and transcriptions of Bach classics for unconventional instruments, weaving in music practices from India and the Middle East
Early Music Vancouver (EMV) invites audiences to revisit some of the most acclaimed works of beloved baroque composer J.S. Bach, presented with bold, new interpretations and incorporating world music traditions, in its 2024 summer festival, BACH UNTAMED, from July 30-August 8, 2024, at various Vancouver venues.
“We are thrilled to offer audiences an adventurous program of some of Bach’s seminal works, but with a twist,” says EMV’s Artistic & Executive Director Suzie LeBlanc. “From traditional compositions reworked for unique instruments, such as mandolin and oud, to the introduction of vocal improvisation, inspired by Bach’s own customary practice of instrumental extemporization, BACH UNTAMED welcomes listeners to seek out new perspectives of Bach’s well-known and beloved classics.”
This year’s festival features a rich ensemble of nearly 50 participating emerging and established international and Canadian early music artists, some of whom will make their EMV debuts. These artists include up-and-coming Canadian cellist Cameron Crozman and Canadian pianist Meagan Milatz, Vancouver-based Hindustani and Jazz vocalist Shruti Ramani, and Montreal-based Lebanese-Palestinian Canadian tenor Haitham Haidar, who lend their artistry to several festival concerts. The highlight of the summer will be the rarely-performed Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610, which will include Cree-Métis Two-Spirit baritone Jonathon Adams, renowned tenor Charles Daniels, Czech soprano Hana Blažikova, and cornetto virtuoso Bruce Dickey among others, led by the Pacific Baroque Orchestra’s director Alexander Weimann.
International multi-instrumentalist Alon Sariel will make both his EMV and Canadian debut as EMV’s 2024 Summer Festival Artist in Residence. In addition to headlining two concerts – Alon Sariel: Plucked Bach, in which he will premiere his own Bach-inspired Mandolin Partita, and EMV’s festival finale Bach & the Mandolin with Alon Sariel, which features the Canadian premiere of Amit Weiner’s 2019 reconstruction of Bach’s Italian Concerto – Sariel will perform in several other festival concerts, as well as teach a workshop on Bach for plucked instruments.
The festival will present its third iteration of EMV: The Next Generation, whose emerging artists have been hand-selected by LeBlanc. Featuring music by Bach, Schubert, and Abel, the afternoon concert will include the EMV debut of 21-year-old baritone and UBC graduate student from Santa Cruz, California, Hans Grunwald, in collaboration with the return of New York-based baroque cellist and gambist, Adrienne Hyde.
BACH UNTAMED’s complete summer festival lineup includes:
Vocal Landscapes of India and Italy
July 30 at 1pm – Christ Church Cathedral
A look at the art of vocal ornamentation and improvisation in Indian and Italian early music. Innovative Hindustani and Jazz vocalist Shruti Ramani joins forces with tenor Charles Daniels to present a meeting of musical styles that share the art of virtuosic improvisation, with multifaceted roles and forms that transcend historical boundaries.
A Tribute to Giovanni Gabrieli: “Immortal Gods, How Great a Man!”
July 30 at 7:30pm – Christ Church Cathedral
A rare tribute to one of the foremost composers of the early Baroque, the Venetian Giovanni Gabrieli. Instrumental to the development of Italian musical culture, Gabrieli’s monumental legacy lived on in his student Heinrich Schütz and other German contemporaries.
Alon Sariel: Plucked Bach
July 31 at 7:30pm – Congregation Beth Israel
“Plucked Bach” realizes the timeless and universal character of Bach’s music in a multifarious sound world of plucked instruments, embodied by the cello suites and violin partitas, alongside Sariel’s own Bach-inspired Mandolin Partita.
Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610
August 1 at 7:30pm – Chan Centre for the Performing Arts
Monteverdi’s Vespers of 1610 is an undisputed masterpiece of spiritual and emotional depth. In this performance of this rarely-performed work, Alexander Weimann leads 10 international soloists and a collection of 17th-century instrumentalists, including the peerless Bruce Dickey on cornetto.
Banned from the Concert Hall: A Comedy Night
August 2 at 7:30pm – Fox Cabaret
A night of dirty drinking songs by Henry Purcell and his 17th-century drinking buddies, covering explicit subject matter from sex and alcohol to scatological humor, sung by a very dynamic trio of tenors.
Cameron Crozman & Meagan Milatz: The Early Romantics
August 6 at 1pm – Christ Church Cathedral
Hailed as “Canada’s next big cello star” by CBC Music, Cameron Crozman makes his Early Music Vancouver debut playing alongside Meagan Milatz, fortepiano, who is “a remarkable pianist with a seemingly limitless palette of expression” (Le Devoir) and quickly emerging as one of the most sought-after collaborative artists in Canada.
Bach Motets: Vanish! Spirits of Gloom
August 6 at 7:30pm – Christ Church Cathedral
Our team of vocal soloists for the Monteverdi Vespers unite again in this programme of motets by J.S. Bach and his predecessors. Shruti Ramani and Haitham Hadar juxtapose the highly developed Indian classical and Middle Eastern styles of ornamentation to that of 18th century German practice.
Bach & French Flair!
August 7 at 7:30pm – Christ Church Cathedral
Two of the most sensual Baroque instruments, the flute and the viola da gamba, join the violin and harpsichord in this chamber music concert. Bach’s sonatas are paired with Rameau’s effervescent music, and French and German styles are brought together in Telemann’s otherworldly Paris Quartet in E minor.
EMV: The Next Generation – A Dedication to Music
August 8 at 1pm – Christ Church Cathedral
A musical reverie of poignant lyricism and melancholy, incorporating the richness of Adrienne Hyde’s gamba playing, the intensity of Bach’s arias, the flexibility of Hans Grunwald’s baritone, the tenderness of Schubert’s lieder, the introspection of Abel’s music for solo gamba.
Bach & the Mandolin with Alon Sariel
August 8 at 7:30pm – Vancouver Playhouse
Centered around Bach’s Italian Concerto and its reconstruction by Amit Weiner (2019), this concert also reveals some of the exquisite Neapolitan repertoire for mandolin and orchestra, as well as other Italian sources of inspiration, such as Vivaldi, whose music Johann Sebastian copied and used for transcriptions of his own.
For information and tickets, visit earlymusic.bc.ca
About Early Music Vancouver (earlymusic.bc.ca)
Early Music Vancouver’s concerts offer a platform for cross-cultural dialogue and exploration of diverse perspectives and relationships with the past. Under the leadership of Artistic/Executive Director, and internationally acclaimed soprano, Suzie LeBlanc, C.M., EMV presents a packed performance calendar with 40+ live performances and digital concerts a year featuring some of the most renowned artists in the early music genre drawn from all parts of the globe.
