A Baroque Cello Extravaganza

What could be better than One cello? Two cellos! Or three, or more . . . !

Featuring six of North Carolina’s fabulous Baroque cellists—Lisa Liske, Chris Nunnally, Caroline Stinson, Stephanie Vial, Sarah Wines, and Brent Wissick— and joined by two students from UNC and Duke University. Works for 2, 3, 4, 6, and 8 cellos by Antoniotti, Gabrielli, Berteau, del Cinque, Corrette, Geminiani, and Pärt.

Holy Trinity Lutheran Church, Chapel Hill Individual Tickets

It’s difficult to imagine a sound more beautiful than a choir of cellos. The pleasure of cellos playing together goes back to the early history of the instrument in the 17^th and 18^th centuries. As the cello grew in popularity not only as an accompaniment instrument but as an important solo voice, cello duets and trios, and even the occasional quartet became increasingly common.

We are so lucky in North Carolina to have a wealth of cellists playing early instruments. Baroque & Beyond is happy to take advantage of this fact, bringing together eight wonderful players and students for a program including cello duets by Georgio Antoniotti and Domenico Gabrielli, cello trios by Martin Berteau and Ermenegildo del Cinque, and a cello quartet by Michel Corrette. We will also play an arrangement for six cellos of Geminiani’s Concerto Grosso ‘La Follia’ and Arvo Pärt’s Fratres, arranged for eight cellos.

It is not commonly known that Fratres, one of Arvo Pärt’s most beloved compositions, was originally composed for the Estonian Early Music Ensemble Hortus Musicus, whose exploration of early Medieval and Renaissance instruments and forms accorded with Pärt’s highly meditative and chant-inspired tintinnabuli style. The work was designed from the outset in 1977 as three-part music without fixed instrumentation. A quick YouTube search will yield a diverse arrangements—wonderful solo sonata versions, often including the compelling variations added by Gidon Kramer in 1980, as well as arrangements for small orchestras and of course cello ensembles. We hope our version for 8 Baroque cellos will prove equally captivating.

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