Reviewed by James Roy MacBean
Friday February 17, 2017 - 11:01:00 AM
Led by their Music Director Jeffrey Thomas, American Bach Soloists gave a series of concerts featuring French Baroque music throughout the Bay Area February 10-13, 2017. I attended their Saturday, February 11 performance at Berkeley’s First Presbyterian Church. In the 17th and early 18th century, French music was centered at the royal courts of King Louis XIII and Louis XIV. Under Louis XIII, an ensemble of the finest string players was created in 1626, called Les vingt-quatre Violons du Roi (The 24 Violins of the King). Occasionally, this group of violins, violas, and cellos combined forces with the royal wind and brass ensemble, La Grande Écurie, so-named because wind and brass music was mostly played for the hunt and dressage, thus emanating from the royal stables. Later, Louis XIV added more string players to the initial 24 strings, and this larger group was called La grande bande.
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