Let me start of by saying that this was my first attendance at an authentic baroque concert.I had long waited to attend one of these and therefore I had built up an incredible amount of excitement for myself. And it felt like a rush of emotions when the first 3 notes where played.
The first piece was the concerto grosso nr.5 in d minor by Charles Avison. The first 7 notes felt like an incredible illuminating force, a concentration of pure grace over taking my mind heart and spirit. As I sat there trying to hold back my perspiring eyes, I heard the next 7 notes which completed the first period of the melody.
I have been admiring Baroque music for about 3 years now, and have been trying to compose my own. I have always tried to imagine the resulting sound but I realize now that it cannot be properly represented by any means other than having to attend a concert.
When I regained control over my mind, heart and soul, I started trying to dissect this great power and trying to find out why I find it so amazing. The first thing that crossed my mind is that the music is actually softer than I had expected. The general cause of this was the use of older instruments which have less projection power. Not that there is anything wrong with that, on the contrary these instruments have this warm, intimate sound to them which balances out better with the harpsichord for this genre. Or maybe I feel this way about it because I’ve been searching to get as close to hearing something authentic to this time period as possible.Next I had realized that we were in a baroque church. This place has a long reverb time. I was probably sitting to far back, but in my seat it sounded far and drowned in the reverb.
After realizing this I started concentrating on the group. And it was very obvious that these musicians were great ones. Everything sounded amazing (if not perfect). The different techniques were executed with precision and care towards the emotions that this music was trying to reach. The first violinist was playing very virtuoso with ease. And the rest of the ensemble was following her tempo with difficulty.
I am considering attending another one of their concerts in the future. Finally I loved how every sound resonated so incredibly well in this building. On every ending of a piece you could hear the last chord being sustain for a few seconds just by the building itself. It made it all sound so much bigger. This was indeed a very amazing experience for me and I look forward to my next concert adventure and musical experience.
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