Musical folly and the pleadings of the faithful

In this edition of Concert Hour, we go singing and dancing in Italy and visit Prague, where church choirs venerate persecuted women of yore with their Gregorian chants.

Your ticket to the German classical music festival scene: Concert Hour has the picks of the season — two hours of music updated regularly. Along with host Rick Fulker, the musicians themselves are on hand to give their insights into the events and the music.

Listen to audio 54:59Concert Hour: Musical folly and sounds of faith, part twoMusical folly

Folly, foolishness, insanity and madness are synonyms for "folia," a form of music that in centuries past, was literally a craze.

This program by Dorothee Oberlinger, one of Germany's most renowned recorder players, is called "Baroque Revelries."

Apart from performing, Oberlinger directs two music festivals, is an instructor at the Mozarteum University in Austria and was named Instrumentalist of the Year at the Opus Classic Awards. As a violinist and countertenor, Dmitry Sinkovsky is doubly talented and also has an ensemble of his own.

The composer Andrea Falconieri, who lived in Naples, was one of the first to popularize the dance rhythms of the folia around the year 1650. From Naples, the folia spread to Rome and Venice, and on to central Europe. This program takes us along on that journey.

A young organist and composer in Cremona, Italy by the name of TarquinioMerula used the crazy obsessive rhythm of the folia in songs like "Folle é ben chesicrede," beginning with the words: "Anyone who thinks that I can be kept away from my sweetheart by tender glances or by slander is crazy."

In the cantata "Mi palpitailcor," composer George Frideric Handel tells a story. A shepherd's heart races in passion for a shepherdess. Overcome by feeling, he's angry with Amor, the god of love, because his feelings are not reciprocated and demands that Amor strike the shepherdess with an arrow from his quiver too. In the end, hope is restored.

Andrea Falconieri

Folias for recorder, violin and continuo

TarquinioMerula

Folleèbenche si crede Arcangelo Corelli

Sonata in F Major, op. 5, No. 10

George Frideric Handel Mi palpitailcor: cantata HWV 132c

Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach Folia for solo harpsichord Performed by: Dorothee Oberlinger, recorder

Dmitry Sinkovsky, violin Marco Testori, cello

Florian Birsak, harpsichord Recorded by Deutschlandfunk in the Basilica in Knechtsteden on September 19, 2020

Women who suffered for their faith

Venerating women who were tortured and killed in the wake of persecution is a tradition at a monastery in Prague. In the second Concert Hour, we listen to Gregorian chants from St. George's Benedictine Monastery in Prague, where Christian saints have always been revered: the Virgin Mary and fellow saints Catherine, Barbara and Margaret. The program is titled Flos inter spinas (Blossoms between thorns), that image symbolizing women of faith in the 3rd century, a time when Christians were persecuted.

Tiburtina's director, Kabatkova, has her reasons for focusing on Gregorian chant and multivoiced medieval music, as she told DW: "I didn't like the recordings I'd heard. I missed passion in them. I love the freedom of medieval music, because although we know a lot about it, there are still some blind spots. So, the only thing you can do is to be free and improvise a bit. That's really what I love."

St. George's Benedictine Monastery in Prague, where the Ensemble Tiburtina is based, was once an important center of the Christian community. Music was collected there to be performed on the feast days of the saints." Many of the pieces on the program were probably composed there as well, explained Barbora----

Kabátková, as she couldn't find them in other European manuscripts.

Gregorian Chant from the Tiburtina in Prague Resp on so ry FiliaeI he ru salem Motet Ave, beat issi mac iv it as– Ave, Maria – Ave, marisstella Music for St. Catherine: Invitatory Adoreturvirginum rex

Lesson of Sancta Catherina Music for St. Catherine:

Motet Salve, virgo, Katherina – Sicut solisradium – Hec dies Hymn Ave, gemma claritatis Music for St. Barbara:

Lesson of Sancta Barbara Res pons oryP is ci nam lava cri Motet Ave, virgo regia – Ave, plena gracie – Fiat

Antiphony Super Magnificat Dulci voce resonet – Canticum BMV

Harp solo

Music for St. Margaret: Res pons oriu mSan ct a Margaret a

Antiphony Sanctum nomen domini

Moteto Ave, virgo – Ave, gloriosa – Domino

Performed by: Tiburtina Ensemble Barbora Kabatkova, conductor Recorded by Radio Deut-

schlandfunk, Cologne (DLF) in the Basilica in Knechtsteden on

September 24, 2020