LONDON SERENATA - CLASSICAL

About

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London Serenata is a new classical music group formed from the Garsington Opera and Glyndeborne on Tour Orchestras. Their aim is to bring all the drama and lyricism of the stage to the special intimacy of chamber music. After an acclaimed launch in October 2019, which included a sell-out concert at Oxford’s venerable Holywell Music Room, their brilliant trajectory was sadly interrupted – like all the Arts – by Lockdown. This is their first concert since then.

'Soloistic vituosity'

The Times

'Superb playing'

Oxford Times

Serenata has tailored their programme of wind serenades to the elegant Georgian Ballroom of Stamford Arts Centre:

The short overture Salieri’s opera La Grotta di Trofonio was arranged by Johann Wendt to accompany social functions at the Schwarzenberg Palace in Vienna in a room very similar to this ballroom. This fabulous piece shows Salieri was far from a musical also-ran.

Next, they play Mozart’s Serenade in E flat k.375, a sublime masterpiece of the “Harmoniemusik” repertoire, designed – like the Salieri piece – to accompany Viennese dinners and entertainments.

1. Allegro maestoso  2. Menuetto  3. Adagio  4. Menuetto-Allegro  5. Allegro

A flute joins them to play the Petite Symphonie pour Instruments a Vent by Charles Gounod. This exquisite piece of musical perfection is suffused by nostalgia for a classical past, and contains an achingly beautiful slow movement.

1. Adagio-Allegro  2. Andante cantabil (quasi adagio)  3. Scherzo. Allegro moderato 4. Finale. Allegretto