Concert #2: Parlor to Pub: 18th Century English Music, Waynesville NC at First United Methodist Church – Waynesville, NC

In 18th-century England, the same music moved freely between the drawing room and the alehouse – the parlor and the pub. Who got to make it, and who got to hear it, depended entirely on who you were.

This program follows that music into both rooms. Handel, Geminiani, and period dance music – minuets, Scottish reels, country dances – performed on a historical harpsichord with baroque violin, oboe, and cello. All performed on period instruments – the actual kinds of instruments these composers wrote for, played the way they were meant to sound. Beautiful, playful, and quietly radical.

This is chamber music at its most sociable and its most alive!

Handel: Suite from Music for the Royal Fireworks (1749 arr.)
Handel: Trio Sonata in G minor, Op. 2 No. 5
Geminiani: Violin Sonata
Period dance music — Minuets, Scottish Reels, Country Dances

This season is named The Great Experiment after the founding vision of our self-governed republic. Chamber music shares many of the virtues required for a democratic republic – trust in one another, freedom of thought and purpose, and a belief in one’s ability to do good for the wider world. Each program this season explores this experiment from a different angle: expansion, equality, and class, and all through the lens of tremendous chamber music performed by tremendous chamber musicians.

CMS Carolinas is a program of Warren Wilson College. If you’d like to support the music beyond your ticket, a tax-deductible donation can be made at cms-carolinas.org – every gift helps bring world-class chamber music to the Blue Ridge and Piedmont.