The European Union Baroque Orchestra, founded in 1985, exists as a stepping stone for the continent’s brightest young baroque specialists, providing an intensive six months of training and touring between conservatoire and career. It disbands and reforms each year with new personnel, and this fleeting, ephemeral existence is clearly what makes it so special.
It catches wonderful musicians averaging just 25 years old and with a strong female bias this year in a temporary state of grace, where all the technical accomplishment in the world is allied to an infectious, undimmed sense of enjoyment and discovery. Rarely have I seen so much smiling communication and listening between musicians on a concert stage.
As a result, this concert, taking place within the faded 18th-century grandeur of Shoreditch Church as part of the Spitalfields Winter Music Festival, was a delicate, joyous gem. Talent oozed from the stage, and Nicolas Sarkozy himself would envy the sort of inspirational control Alexis Kossenko exerted over his international colleagues – 17 players drawn from eight different countries. The young Frenchman already has a considerable career under his belt, and here directed with balletic showmanship. He took up his recorder and flute for concertos by Samartini and Telemann, and Bach’s famous B minor Orchestral Suite which closed the programme, playing with a daring, virtuosic freedom.
The well-planned programme, entitled A Breath of Enlightenment, included other works by composers both obscure and well-known: Locatelli’s urbane “Christmas Concerto”, an overture from a suite by Christoph Graupner, a sonata by Johan Georg Pisendel.
Yet it also demonstrated this repertoire’s ability to surprise. Whenever the music seemed in danger of slipping into efficient Baroque convention, these composers confounded expectations, something that the musicians delighted in underlining.
The adagio second movement of the Telemann concerto saw Kossenko share a duet with the orchestra’s concertmaster – the serene, supreme Zefira Valova – against an unexpected pizzicato accompaniment, for example, before she took over the solo spotlight. The Geminiani Concerto Grosso that held the central position in the second half had over a dozen movements toppling over each other in quick succession, and allowed an outstanding solo group to shine, particularly in the touching “Affetuoso”.
The stately formality of Bach’s suite risked sounding stiff by comparison, but it too was brilliantly brought to life, with outstanding contributions from Anna Flumiani’s mellow bassoon. The encore was a rarity, the ethereally beautiful “Consolazione” from Graupner’s suite, exquisitely performed. Wonderful, uplifting stuff.
