Seasons > 2003-04 Season > Concerts >

Empfindsamkeit

Friday September 26, 2003, 8:00 pm

Pre-romantic music by C.P.E. Bach
With Pablo Valetti, baroque violin.

The idea that music is the ideal mode for expressing emotion, first articulated around 1600, was revived during the 18th century, especially in the German-speaking countries. In the original Baroque version of this idea, the emotions that music expressed were codified, more or less, into the idealized set of what were known as affetti. In the 18th-century revival of this idea, however, what music best expressed were the feelings of its actual composers. This new sensibility—known in German as Empfindsamkeit—can be called pre-Romantic. Its greatest exponent was, probably, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach. All music, he believed, should come from the composer’s heart, and touch that of the listener. His abundant work, remarkable for its originality and emotional intensity, stands as a bridge between what his father’s generation wrote and what the future was to bring.

This concert will also be held at the Maison de la culture de Pointe-aux-Trembles (514-872-2240) on September 27, and at Stewart Hall (514-630-1220) in Pointe-Claire on September 28.

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