Salish Sea Early Music Festival to Perform 19th Century Serenades

Sunday, February 24, 7:30 p.m. Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church

— from Jeffrey Cohen —

Early 19th-Century Serenades: Guitar, Viola and Flute will be presented by the ninth annual Salish Sea Early Music Festival on Sunday evening, February 24 at 7:30 PM at the Orcas Adventist Fellowship Church at 107 Enchanted Forest Road in Eastsound. Guitarist Oleg Timofeyev, flutist Jeffrey Cohan and violist Stephen Creswell perform Serenades by Leonardo de Call, Gaspard Kummer and Joseph Küffner for a most unusual ensemble that existed only during the early decades of the 19th century, performed on instruments from Beethoven’s time. Please see the full San Juan Islands schedule for this performance and the complete Orcas Island Festival schedule below.

Please see www.salishseafestival.org/orcas for additional information. Admission is by suggested donation: $15, $20 or $25 (a free will offering), and those 18 & under are free.

The program will include the Sérénade by guitarist and mandolin virtuoso Leonardo de Call (1767-1815), the Troisième Sérénade by flutist Anton Bernhard Fürstenau (1792-1852), and another Troisième Sérénade by violinist and guitar composer Joseph Küffner (1776-1856). These early 19th-century trios are for an unusual combination of instruments that was in vogue only during a few decades and are representative of the emerging romanticism of the early 19th century and the subsequent blossoming of chamber music with guitar by virtuosos on their evolving instruments. This golden age for solo and ensemble music with guitar was ushered into being as the industrial revolution and a culture-hungry new middle class brought forth expressive trends less affected by stylistic constraints of the past, and as composers took advantage of significant changes in the tonal capabilities of musical instruments, prompting a dynamic new virtuoso interaction in chamber music between instrumentalists.

Jeffrey Cohan will play an 8-keyed flute made in London in 1820 of Jamaican cocuswood with silver ornamental rings and keys, made in London in 1820 by George Rudall with assistance from George Willis. In 1821 Rudall joined with Rose to make Rudall & Rose flutes, which have found their way into the hands of some of today’s most well-known flutists playing traditional Irish music. Oleg Timofeyev’s guitar was also made in 1820 in Russia.

In 2019 the Salish Sea Early Music Festival presents 8 performances on Orcas Island and around the Salish Sea of early chamber music performed on period instruments. The festival has presented countless first performances in modern times of period instrument renditions of early works, and is proud to be an affiliate organization of Early Music America, which develops, strengthens, and celebrates early music and historically informed performance in North America. Flutist Jeffrey Cohan is the festival’s artistic director. Additional information is available at www.salishseafestival.org/orcas.