Apollo’s Fire @ St. Paul’s Episcopal Church 3/4/11
German chamber music must have been lovely to hear, lighting up the dark in the great stone buildings created to keep out the cold and call in God. There was a sense of hope underlying the mostly solemn music that Apollo’s Fire presented Friday at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in a concert dubbed “Mysteries Sacred & Profane.”
Vernika Skuplik, violinist, served as guest director of the program of 17th-century music by Heinrich Biber, J. C. Bach (son of J. S. Bach), and others of the era. As is traditional with Apollo’s Fire concerts, the music often flowed seamlessly from one piece to another.
Skuplik and Julie Andrijeski (violin), Karina Fox (viola), Rene Schiffer (cello), Andreas Arend (theorbo), and Peter Bennett (organ) did justice to the works played, especially “The Annunication” by Biber. Baritone Jeffrey Strauss brought warmth and dramatic color to Nicolaus Bruhns’ “De profundis” and J. C. Bach’s “Wie bist du denn, o Gott.” Arend’s solo passages on the theorbo showed what a wonderful musical instrument it is — wish we could hear it in contemporary pieces more often.
Still, it was a dreary and rain-filled night and the grave music (though beautifully played) left me more somber than cheered — oh well, I was in a church, a place where serious thoughts about last things are likely useful things to have once in a while. April promises some musical flowers with a program titled “Bach, Telemann, and the Bohemian Gypsies” running Wed 4/13 – Sun 4/17.
Laura Kennelly is a freelance arts journalist, a member of the Music Critics Association of North America, and an associate editor of BACH, a scholarly journal devoted to J. S. Bach and his circle.
Listening to and learning more about music has been a life-long passion. She knows there’s no better place to do that than the Cleveland area.
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