Monday 12 December | 7:45pm

Doors & bar 6:45pm | Concert 7:45pm, ends 9:00pm, no interval

Tickets £22 / £11 (under 25) Music for Awhile | Candlelit Concert (staplefordgranary.org.uk) and Box Office 01223 849004

Judy Louie Brown, mezzo soprano | Malachy Frame, baritone | David Blackadder, trumpet | Margaret Faultless, violin / director | Rachel Stroud, violin | Anna Curzon, violin & viola | Andrew Skidmore, cello

Henry Purcell – Sonata for Trumpet & Strings in D major

Henry Purcell – 3 Parts Upon a Ground

Johann Sebastian Bach – from Christmas Oratorio:

Bereite dich, Zion, mit zärtlichen Trieben

Erleucht’ auch meine finstre Sinnen  

Schlafe, mein Liebster, geniesse der Ruh 

Grosser Herr

George Frideric Handel – from The Messiah:

Overture

Thus saith the Lord

But who may abide

O thou that tellest good tidings

For Behold, Darkness shall cover the earth

The People who walked in darkness

He was despised

Behold, I tell you a mystery

The Trumpet shall sound

Artistic Director of Music for Awhile, violinist Margaret Faultless is a leader of The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and for ten years was the leader of the Amsterdam Baroque Orchestra. She is Director of Performance at the Faculty of Music in Cambridge and Head of Historical Performance at The Royal Academy of Music. She and Simon Whistler co-founded Music for Awhile in 1996 as a collective of Europe’s most established early music performers, inspiring audiences with repertoire from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries using the instruments of the time. They are renowned for their adventurous programming, with a special flair for tailoring adaptations of large-scale works for intimate venues.

Tonight’s concert is one such programme. It opens with two pieces by Purcell – a pioneering early concert work for trumpet and a thrilling set of variations – and features arias from Bach’s much-loved exploration of the Christmas story. A generous selection of pieces from Handel’s perennial favourite The Messiah brings this glorious programme of festive music to a close.