This presentation will discuss the life and compositions of German composer Christoph Graupner (1683-1760), a contemporary of Bach, Händel and Telemann. Graupner’s music was almost lost forever after his death due to his request that it should all be destroyed. For over two centuries it remained ‘out of bounds’ and it was not until the 1970s that access was fully reopened.
After providing the context in which Graupner was employed, and his position amongst his contemporaries, and his overall compositional output, the focus will shift to the many works in which he featured the viola d’amore and in particular the two double concertos for viola d’amore and viola. It will explore the reasons the viola d’amore was so highly regarded by him and will investigate scordatura possibilities other than the standard ADADFAD tuning most commonly used in the baroque era.
After sharing an innovative approach to scordatura notation to cover any potential tuning of the open strings, the presentation will conclude with a performance of the double concerto in A major GWV339 utilising a non-standard viola d’amore scordatura to maximise the instrument’s natural resonances.
Donald Maurice will be joined as co-soloist by Polish violist Marcin Murawski, with whom he made the world premiere recording of this work, released in 2017 by Acte Prealable, a Warsaw-based record company. They will arrive in Rotterdam directly from a project in Poland, filming performances of concertos by Graupner featuring the viola d’amore, on location in historic buildings.
The pedagogical approach to this project is to perform on modern instruments at A=440mz observing best practice in stylistic fidelity. Apart from the circumstances of performance mentioned above that identify with the conference theme of innovative approaches to performance, the filming project that immediately precedes this lecture recital, and which will be released in early 2019, aims to be a world leader in presenting ancient music with innovative 21st century media possibilities.
Maurice and Murawski each have produced extensive discographies in their own right and this collaboration between them has also played a role, through their respective embassies, in fostering a strong cultural relationship between Poland and New Zealand.
Performance: Concerto in A major GWV339 for viola d’amore and viola
Christoph Graupner (1683-1760)
Ensemble: 3/2/2/2/1 + continuo (clvc)
Annette-Barbara Vogel, Laura von der Goltz, (violin 1);
Kelvin Mun, Hans van der Weide, Josca van Duijvendijk (violin 2)
Matthew Antal, Elyse Dalabakis (violas)
Keimpke Zigterman, cello
NOTE: A full premiere showing of the movie "Christoph Graupner: For viola d'amore and more" will be given this afternoon at 16:30h in Studio 5 => link:
https://ivc2018.sched.com/event/IwUF