Event

From Chaos to the Sublime

The Albany Consort opens its 46th season with a program sure to delight and amaze you. Seven musicians take you "From Chaos to the Sublime", painting the vivid musical landscape of Europe in turmoil. The program begins with Le Cahos by Jean-Féry Rebel, which begins with the most dissonant chord of any music from that time. It winds its way through the elegant and ingenious Henry Purcell (an In Nomine in the old manner and a Chacony following the newer practice) and the dramatic "phantasticus" style of Giovanni Legrenzi, ending with the poignantly sublime Passacaglia of Georg Muffat, the man who thought that if the musical styles of Europe could merge, then the raging wars would come to an end. The program's centerpiece is Bach's Fifth Brandenburg Concerto, a great experiment in keyboard virtuosity that paved the way for the concertos of Mozart, Beethoven and Rachmaninov.