Events

HERVÉ NIQUET, conductor

 

 

Jean-Baptiste Lully: Plaude laetare Gallia, motet

André Campra: Cantate Domino, motet

Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Epithalamio in lode dell’Altezza serenissima elettorale di Massimiliano Emanuele, Duca di Baviera, cantata, H. 473

Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Marches pour les trompettes, H. 547

Marc-Antoine Charpentier: Te Deum, H. 146

 

The programme titled Music from the French Courts will be the first time that frequent Zagreb guest, renowned conductor and harpsichordist Hervé Niquet will appear at the helm of the Orchestra, Choir, and soloists of the Academy of Music, University of Zagreb.

In April 2025, students of the Academy of Music staged the opera Hippolyte and Aricie by Jean-Philippe Rameau at their Academy, and this concert will deepen their knowledge and introduce the audience to the specificities of the French Baroque style. Maestro Niquet will pass on to them his first-hand secrets of a historically informed approach.

 

The program mainly features sacral works that often evoke courtly opulence through lavish instrumentation and, for that time, large vocal forces.  The exception is the secular, Italian cantata Epithalamio, i.e. epithalamium (a wedding song) composed  by Marc-Antoine Charpentier for the wedding of the Bavarian Prince-Elector, who was also the brother-in-law of the Crown Prince Louis XIV.

 

Charpentier’s music will predominate at Lisinski Hall that evening, but we will also hear a motet by his more influential and powerful rival, founder of French opera Jean-Baptiste Lully, composed for the baptism of the aforementioned heir to the throne in 1668.

 

Finally, the program also includes a motet by the youngest composer featured, Cantate Domino by André Campra. These are rarely performed pieces, with the exception of the grand motet and most famous work by Charpentier, one of his four musical settings of the hymn Te Deum. Suffice it to say that the prelude to this piece is well known to fans of Baby Lasagna and Marko Bošnjak!