Discovery of Passion

This concert brings together two key figures in current baroque music: Dorothee Oberlinger, recorder player and conductor of Ensemble 1700; and Dmitry Sinkovsky, violinist and singer, whose rare and spectacular dual role is exceptional in the world of baroque music. The program’s connecting thread: the evolution, on the cusp of the 16th and 17th centuries, toward a more theatrical and impassioned new musical style. That evolution marks the advent of both opera and sonatas, thereby announcing modernity. An anthology of Italian vocal and instrumental works magnificently illustrates rhetoric and affect’s reign over music. A contemporary work has been slipped into the program as a counterpoint: every bit as eloquent, it was commissioned in 2018 specifically for these two performers, with their obvious and enjoyable complicity.