Cathedral hosts pick of summer’s special events

Last Thursday, I looked ahead to the regular summer series that are returning, though I hardly exhausted the options for classical music over the coming months. The summer will also be unusually rich in special musical events, particularly at Christ Church Cathedral.

Among these will be two concerts by the Victoria Symphony, which in 2016 began giving summer performances again at the cathedral after a hiatus of almost a decade. (The orchestra is also giving concerts this summer at Butchart Gardens, the Ogden Point Barge and Centennial Square, in addition to the Splash event at the Inner Harbour on Aug. 5.)

On July 25, Giuseppe Pietraroia, the Victoria Symphony’s resident conductor, will lead a mostly-Beethoven program including excerpts from the Fifth and Sixth Symphonies and closing with Wellington’s Victory, or the Battle of Vitoria, which Beethoven wrote in 1813 to celebrate the Duke of Wellington’s recent defeat of the French army in Spain. This vividly programmatic work, hugely popular in its day, is under-appreciated today, and great fun.

On Aug. 1, a young guest conductor, Seattle-based Alastair Willis, will direct the orchestra in a program comprising suites by three French composers (Bizet, Debussy, Ravel) and one honorary Frenchman, Stravinsky. (Both 7:30 p.m., $25, two-concert pass $40; victoriasymphony.ca.)

Of special note at Christ Church this summer are five early-music concerts of the highest calibre.

The earliest, on July 20, will feature the Gesualdo Six, a consort of young British vocalists formed in 2014 but already internationally renowned (7:30 p.m., Chapel of the New Jerusalem, $25; christchurchcathedral.bc.ca). Their appearance here is part of a 12-day, seven-city Canadian tour and follows the recent release of their first CD, English Motets, by Hyperion Records.

Their Christ Church program will include British folksongs, Renaissance English and northern-European fare, a piece by Poulenc and works by several contemporary English, American and Canadian composers.

The other four early-music concerts will launch a welcome new venture: the Pacific Baroque Series, a year-round collaboration between the cathedral, the Pacific Baroque Festival and Early Music Vancouver, featuring both local and visiting performers (pacbaroque.com).

The first concert, on July 27, is very enticing: the outstanding young French keyboard player Benjamin Alard performing Bach’s Goldberg Variations on the cathedral’s organ (7:30 p.m., $25/$15). Alard, who has already recorded prolifically, was recently signed by Harmonia Mundi to record Bach’s complete keyboard works (Vol. 1 appeared in June).

Yes, the Goldberg Variations was conceived for the harpsichord, but it is now a staple of the piano repertoire, too, and has been performed in arrangements for clavichord, lute, guitar, cimbalom, accordion, synthesizer and countless ensembles. It is also popular among organists.

The biggest news this summer is the return of Canadian pianist Angela Hewitt, one of the world’s foremost classical soloists.

Her first recital here was a sold-out appearance at the cathedral in 2015, in a varied program, but when she returns on Aug. 2 it will be in a program devoted to Bach, of whose music she is widely ranked among the outstanding contemporary interpreters. She will perform Book 2 of The Well-Tempered Clavier — all 24 pairs of preludes and fugues (7:30 p.m., $45/$30, premium package $120).

The WTC is the Old Testament of the keyboard repertoire, and Book 2 alone comprises well over two hours of intellectually and technically rigorous music, so this counts as incredibly generous programming on Hewitt’s part.

(Note to early-music nerds willing to cross the Strait: Early Music Vancouver is offering the opportunity to hear Alard play the Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord on July 30, and to hear Hewitt play Book 1 of the WTC on July 31. earlymusic.bc.ca.)

The final summer concerts of the inaugural Pacific Baroque Series will be on the last full days of the season, Sept. 20 and 21, when Beiliang Zhu, principal cellist of the Vancouver-based Pacific Baroque Orchestra, will perform all six of Bach’s suites for unaccompanied cello — the Old Testament of the cello repertoire. More on that at a later date.