The Garage, 14 Chapel Field North, Norwich NR2 1NY

The Bach Players join hands with Ricardo Barros to present a concert that embodies the European idea in music and dance. Artists have always travelled and this programme will take you on a journey across the continent. Some of the music will be danced to, providing an enjoyable reminder that dance was fundamental to music in the baroque period. Telemann’s suite ‘Les Nations’, in which the characters of European countries are depicted in music, is followed by Rebel’s ‘Les Caractères de la danse’: a compendium of the main dance forms of the period. In Telemann’s ‘burlesque’ of Don Quichotte the Spanish nobleman of Cervantes’s novel lives in an imaginary world in which he chases windmills and hankers after sweet Dulcinée. A fable for the times in which we live? The concert concludes with Vivaldi’s passionate and hugely popular set of variations on ‘La Follia’. The concert can be enjoyed by people of all ages.

The music

Georg Philipp Telemann (1681–1767), Les Nations (orchestral suite in B-flat major TWV 55:B5)

François Couperin (1688–1733), ‘Les Folies Françaises’ from _Pièces de clavecin, troisième livre, treizième ordre_

Jean-Féry Rebel (1666–1747), Les Caractères de la Danse

François Couperin, ‘Les Petits Moulins à vent’ from _Pièces de clavecin, troisième livre, dixseptième ordre_

Georg Philipp Telemann, Burlesque de Quixotte (orchestral suite, TWV 55:G10)

Antonio Vivaldi (1678–1741), ‘La Follia’ (op. 1, sonata no. 12 in D minor, RV 63)

The musicians

Ricardo Barros dance and choreography, Nicolette Moonen violin, Anna Curzon violin, Rachel Stott viola, Olaf Reimers cello, Silas Wollston harpsichord