A. VIVALDI: Sinfonia “al Santo Sepolcro”, RV 169
J. TAVENER: Depart in Peace for solo soprano, solo violin, tampura and strings
G. PAISIELLO: Sinfonia funebre
M. THEODORAKIS: A day in May, Weeping eyes, My mother is weeping at the tomb,
Sorrow has no words (arr. Α. Baltas)
Soloists: Elli Koutsouli (soprano)
Michalis Kouloumis (violin)
Conductor: Alkis Baltas
The Sinfonia “al Santo Sepolcro” is not your typical Vivaldi work. In two movements, an adagio and a fugue, it was possibly intended to be heard between Maundy Thursday and Holy Saturday in the chapel of the Ospedale della Pieta. Composed around 1730, its music expresses grief, with the two fugue subjects intersecting in an allusion to the cross as an image of the Divine Passion. British composer John Tavener, who passed away in 2013, wrote the moving …Depart in Peace… following the death of his father. The work encompasses elements of the Greek Orthodox liturgy and the “Song of Simeon” (“Nunc dimitis” in Latin). The Sinfonia Funebre by Paisiello (1740-1816) is, as the title suggests, a “funereal symphony”, while the ballads by Theodorakis which round off the programme are but four examples of the Greek composer’s more lyrical output.
