Music of Luigi Boccherini featured by the Pacific Baroque Orchestra

by David Gordon Duke

Western Canada’s ranking authentic instrument ensemble, the Pacific Baroque Orchestra, begins its 2005/06 season this weekend, with a pair of concerts featuring the music of Luigi Boccherini.

Special focus orchestras began to appear on the Canadian scene in the late ’70s with Toronto’s Tafelmusik, joined in the’'80s by Quebec City’s Les Violons du Roy. The PBO set up shop in 1990 as an ambitious West Coast-based ensemble, its goals to bring the unique sounds of the Classical and Baroque eras to local audiences and to expand our understanding of the 18th century repertoire beyond the handful of period “classics” in the mainstream symphonic repertoire.

The music of Luigi Boccherini (1743-1805), one of those composers far better known in his own day than ours, is just the thing for the group. We sometimes hear the Fandango finale from his D major Guitar Quintet and a coy little Minuet (anyone remember the mordant 1955 Ealing comedy The Ladykillers?), and that’s just about it.

Very much in the 18th century manner, Luigi Boccherini was a prolific generalist: symphonies, church music, and chamber music flowed from his pen. Italian born and trained, he had considerable success as early as the 1760s through concertizing, publishing, and court appointments. He ended up in Madrid, where by the end of the century tastes had changed and Boccherini hadn't. His elegant style had worn out its welcome and his reputation ebbed into obscurity.

PBO director Marc Destrubé has programmed two important selections: the Stabat Mater for solo voice and orchestra, and Musica notturna per le strade di Madrid (Night Music from the Streets of Madrid). Both display the skill, diversity, and originality of the neglected master. Boccherini’s music isn't always at its best on modern instruments, Destrubé insists; but given the colours of original instruments, his work comes blazing back to life for contemporary audiences.

Along with the Boccherini, there’s an earlier symphony by G. B. Sammartini, as well as the revival of a newly composed PBO hit. It’s become a part of the orchestra’s tradition to commission new music for their old instruments. Jocelyn Morlock’s Golden, an elegy for Russian-born composer Nicolai Korndorf, has proved a stunning success on PBO tours.

You can hear Golden, as well as the best of Boccherini, at
8 p.m., Saturday at Kitsilano’s St. Augustine’s Church, and 2:30 p.m., Sunday at West Vancouver United Church.

Vancouver Sun
10 November 2005

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