Sunday morning , March 14th, I stumbled into a Dutch radio program with classical music. I listen fascinated to an accordion and a cello playing the for me so familiar accompaniment notes of the Quando Corpus from Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater. Two instruments are enough to feel the desolation that Pergolesi put on paper in notes.
Not only the two instrumentalists (Vincent van Amsterdam, accordion and Diederik van Dijk, cello) but also the singers (Titia van Heyst, soprano, Esther Kuiper, mezzo) make me curious to hear their performance of the entire Stabat Mater.
So we visited their Stabat Mater – concert in the Groenmarktkerk in Haarlem July 14th. And again I was struck by the intimacy but also the liveliness of the performance and how the original string parts could be heard in the cello and the accordion.
In Naples, in the days of Pergolesi, religious music could have something of an opera. The two singers showed this beautifully in their experienced performance.
The four musicians call their program a Pocket Pergolesi. A short concert with an intimate line-up that can also be performed in Corona Time: with an audience 1,5 meters apart and well-ventilated churches and concert halls.
Next concert with the Pocket Pergolesi on the program: Februari 12, 2022, Valthermond, Drenthe.
Of the concert is no CD-recording. But thanks to the four performers, we will soon be able to let you hear a part of their concert in the Groenmarktkerk on July 14, 2021!