Fireworks from Bach and Handel
Leonardo García Alarcón conducts the Concertgebouw Orchestra
Leonardo García Alarcón returns to the Concertgebouw Orchestra conducting Handel’s festive Music for the Royal Fireworks and masterpieces by Johann Sebastian Bach
Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3 is still very popular to this day, particularly for its well-loved second movement – the peaceful Air for strings. Pure bliss!
Concert programme
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Suite No. 3, BWV 1068
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Arias from the cantata ‘Geschwinde, ihr wirbelnden Winde’, BWV 201
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Sinfonia from the cantata 'Am Abend aber desselbigen Sabbats', BWV 42
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George Frideric Handel
Music for the Royal Fireworks, HWV 351
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Johann Sebastian Bach
Arias from the cantata ‘Zerreisset, zersprenget, zertrümmert die Gruft’, BWV 205
Performers
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Leonardo García Alarcón
conductor
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Andreas Wolf
bass
About this concert
The Concertgebouw Orchestra takes flight in Baroque music when Leonardo García Alarcón is conducting. After his impressive first appearance in 2022, the Argentine conductor returns; this time he will be weaving works by Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel into a festive whole, inspired by the concerts which Bach himself used to organise at Leipzig’s Café Zimmermann.
Andreas Wolf’s rich, round bass is heard in a number of phenomenal arias from secular cantatas (chamber operas) which Bach wrote in the same period. They alternate with parts of two ‘greatest hits’ of the eighteenth century, Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3 and Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks.
Music for the Royal Fireworks was composed for a fireworks display organised by King George II to celebrate the signing of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Despite it all going up in flames and the crowds fleeing, Handel’s suite was an instant success and helped save the monarch’s reputation. Equally popular to this day is Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3, particularly for its famous second movement, the peaceful Air for strings. Pure bliss!
Dates and tickets
About this concert
The Concertgebouw Orchestra takes flight in Baroque music when Leonardo García Alarcón is conducting. After his impressive first appearance in 2022, the Argentine conductor returns; this time he will be weaving works by Johann Sebastian Bach and George Frideric Handel into a festive whole, inspired by the concerts which Bach himself used to organise at Leipzig’s Café Zimmermann.
Andreas Wolf’s rich, round bass is heard in a number of phenomenal arias from secular cantatas (chamber operas) which Bach wrote in the same period. They alternate with parts of two ‘greatest hits’ of the eighteenth century, Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3 and Handel’s Music for the Royal Fireworks.
Music for the Royal Fireworks was composed for a fireworks display organised by King George II to celebrate the signing of the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle. Despite it all going up in flames and the crowds fleeing, Handel’s suite was an instant success and helped save the monarch’s reputation. Equally popular to this day is Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3, particularly for its famous second movement, the peaceful Air for strings. Pure bliss!