Can you believe it’s been almost two years since we celebrated Claudio Monteverdi’s 400th anniversary with two ground-breaking performances of his Vespers of 1610? Now we will celebrate the music of Giovanni Gabrieli (1554-1612), and this time it’s the 400th anniversary of his death. Over the past couple of weeks, Carl Crosier has been hard at working pulling together the scores of an upcoming concert titled “Glorious Gabrieli” on Saturday, September 29th at St. Andrew’s Cathedral, 7:30 pm.

Giovanni Gabrieli’s glorious music for voices and brass spread the fame of Venice as the capital of ceremony in early Baroque Italy. This past summer Carl and I visited San Marco and although we visited the famous Basilica of San Marco where Gabrieli and Monteverdi worked, we were sorry not to have heard live music in this wonderful space.

A number of LCHers are involved this concert sponsored by Early Music Hawaii. The University of Hawaii Chamber Singers, conducted by Miguel Felipe, will join the Bach Chamber Choir soloists, strings and brass of the Bach Chamber Orchestra. Carl Crosier is serving as Artistic Director and will conduct several pieces. Even the little continuo organ from LCH will be traveling to St. Andrew’s, played by yours truly, and it looks like it will be another one of those concerts in which I will be reading figured bass scores like crazy. See my earlier posts about this musical shorthand by clicking here. You will be glad to know that Matthew Tresler, one of our Monteverdi tenors, will be joining us in this concert. And yes, we will be bringing in a theorbo player, too!

For tickets, please go to the Early Music Hawaii website.