Mendelssohn’s ever-popular violin concerto, full of drama and exquisite melody, here accompanies a real rarity—Schumann’s hauntingly beautiful Requiem. Written after he had committed himself to an asylum, it’s a fantastic showcase for the rich, resonant sound of the Philharmonia Chorale. A feast for lovers of the romantic era of music and a suitably dramatic way to finish our season.

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Romantic Radiance

First Congregational Church

War Memorial and Performing Arts Center

Stanford University

The popularity of the coffee shop didn’t start with Starbucks—back in the Baroque era it was the place to hang out, to see and be seen, to gossip, meet friends and to discover the latest music. We invite you to be transported back in time to our own coffee shop to hear double Harpsichord Concertos featuring Bach’s usual invention, energy and drive, (here played by husband-wife duo of Richard Egarr and Alexandra Nepomnyashchaya), paired with music of grace and charm by Telemann.

Double Espresso

First Congregational Church of Berkeley

First United Methodist Church

Be inspired, transported and uplifted in this, a journey through no less than 600 years of music celebrating Christmas. From Pachelbel’s beloved Canon, heard afresh on our period instruments, through to the rich, melting harmonies of Tchaikovsky and John Taverner’s spare, haunting, The Lamb, plus a brand new piece by Roderick Williams, written especially for the occasion. Music that will resonate with you for long after the concert, and a perfect start to the Holiday season.

Six Centuries Of Christmas

Music of vivid detail, color and emotional resonance—Salomone Rossi’s Ha-shirim asher li-Shlomo, The Songs of Solomon, gets a celebratory 400th anniversary performance in a concert that features select members of our amazing Chorale. A composer whose music bridged the musical worlds of late Renaissance and early Baroque, Rossi’s The Songs of Solomon (the name of which is probably a pun on the composer’s name) is unique in marrying Hebrew text with early baroque musical style.

Songs Of Solomon

San Francisco War Memorial

Mark Twain famously said “If I had more time
I would have written a shorter letter.” Henry Purcell’s mini-masterpiece Dido and Aeneas distills all the drama and power usually found in a standard-length opera into a taut, fast moving and ultimately devastatingly powerful 60 minutes, along the way taking in a love story, pirates, sorcery and drunken sailors, all painted in vivid musical detail.

Dido & Aeneas

Reinvention has always been a theme within classical music—
be it Handel blatantly reusing his own tunes, Mendelssohn giving us his own take on Bach, or Stravinsky ‘remixing’ the classical form. Bringing that tradition right up to date is Dido’s Ghost, effectively providing a sequel to Purcell’s masterpiece Dido and Aeneas, which is performed in its entirety, as if a flashback, in Wallen’s work. Dido’s Ghost bridges worlds and eras, and past blurs into present in an acclaimed new opera that’s direct from premiere performances in London and Edinburgh.

Dido's Ghost

Handel was a man who understood the theater and its audience—always after his next hit, seeking to please his public. In this concert of contrasts and connections, we showcase his music for the stage, always recognizable by its emotional clarity, and at the heart of the evening place a duo of compositions exploring the creation story by two of today’s most powerful musical voices: Errollyn Wallen CBE and PBO’s Composer-in-Residence Tarik O’Regan.

Garden Of  Good & Evil

It’s easy to forget now, when the music seems so familiar, that composers throughout history have been innovators, producing music that startled, confounded and even shocked audiences of their day. So it’s entirely natural that one of the “disruptors” of 21st century classical music, Mason Bates, rubs shoulders with Franz Biber, Georg Muffat, and Johann Heinrich Schmelzer in this program. Known for his compositions which bring together the worlds of orchestral music and electronics, Mason’s new work for us is sure to be an unmissable opener to these concerts.
Muffat shared Mason’s love of combining unlikely bedfellows, known for combining contrasted national musical styles. In these season-closing concerts we hear his celebratory Mass, together with a selection of rich and multi-layered Sonatas by Biber and a wrenching lament for strings and continuo by Schmelzer.

From Muffat to Mason

Sorcery, jealous rages, desire, and hellish Demons all come into play in Handel’s opera Amadigi di Gaula. This compact, taut drama is a vehicle for Handel to do what he did best: exploring the emotions of his characters, from love to suffering—reflecting on sentiment in a way perhaps deeper than in any of his other operas. In this composition he conjures a surprising sound world with star countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo here in the title role. Handel also makes prominent use of wind instruments, which make the music unusually colorful, befitting this story which explores the full gamut of human emotion.
Amadigi di Gaula is a co-production between Boston Baroque and Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chrorale.

Handel's Amadigi di Gaula

Diane B. Wilsey Center for Opera

There are some works that never fail to send a shiver down one’s spine, no matter how familiar you are with them—and Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 20 is one such piece, balancing fragility and limpid beauty with muscularity and depth. These performances add a layer of intrigue with the delicate voice of the fortepiano, in the hands of a wizard of this instrument—Kristian Bezuidenhout.
The concerts are concluded with one of Mozart’s positively sparkling Symphony No. 33, a piece full of light, air and transparency—think of it as a glass of champagne to contrast with the rich ruby port of the earlier piano concerto.
Interspersing Mozart is an overture from Joseph Martin Kraus, nick-named the ‘Swedish Mozart’ and known for sudden twists and turns in the harmony of his music, plus a work that had great influence on the young Mozart—J.C. Bach’s innovative and appealing Symphony in G minor.

A Glassful of Mozart

A new way to enjoy PBO, these informal concerts are introduced from the stage and feature three of Bach’s unfailingly popular Brandenburg concertos, music that’s full of foot-tappingly good tunes. After the hour-long performance enjoy refreshments on us, and there’s even a chance to chat with our music director Richard Egarr over your coffee.

Coffee & Cake

Taube Koret Campus for Jewish Life

Piedmont Community Hall

Congregation Beth Sholom

Combining period performance orchestras and later repertoire always makes for a thrilling experience—hearing familiar music performed in a fresh, vibrant way is like seeing an old master painting with years of accumulated grime removed after a restoration.
Expect that “shock of the old” with this concert that features the great cellist Steven Isserlis performing both of Saint-Saëns’ cello concertos—the impassioned first and the fiendishly technical second with its fiery opening and serene and sublime central movement.
That serenity continues in Brahms’ Second Symphony, often dubbed his “pastoral.” There’s power behind that tranquility though, with the final movement bringing the symphony to a conclusion that is pure exultation.

Old Friends Made New

Handel’s Messiah is one of those pieces which we think we all know, and then we sit in front of it and are once again wowed and reminded just what a genius Handel was. How many works have SO many great tunes? How many of them bear repeated listening, revealing new things each time? How many take you on a dramatic roller coaster encompassing rage, sorrow, joy, and jubilation? How many can still pack an emotional gut-punch even though you’ve heard them before? Messiah can.
In this pre-holiday treat Music Director Richard Egarr is back and joined by a top-flight roster of great soloists. Join us and be uplifted.

Handel’s Messiah

We welcome back Music Director Laureate Nicholas McGegan for this feast of French Baroque entertainment.
And what entertainment it is. Rameau’s music always defies expectations, and Les Surprises de l’Amour is no exception—the music of this opera-ballet is packed full of enchanting moments. Its companion here is a genre-defining piece that blends styles traditional and sensational, ballet and opera, French passion and Italian humor. Campra’s “The Carnival of Venice” was a smash hit in his time, and certainly continues to deliver that same one-of-a-kind thrill—a spirited experience like no other.

Vaudeville Baroque

We welcome back Music Director Laureate Nicholas McGegan for this feast of French Baroque entertainment.

And what entertainment it is. Rameau’s music always defies expectations, and Les Surprises de l’Amour is no exception—the music of this opera-ballet is packed full of enchanting moments. Its companion here is a genre-defining piece that blends styles traditional and sensational, ballet and opera, French passion and Italian humor. Campra’s “The Carnival of Venice” was a smash hit in his time, and certainly continues to deliver that same one-of-a-kind thrill—a spirited experience like no other.

The Surprises of Love

In the 1700s Handel took London by storm, penning hit after hit for what we might now consider to be the West End Stage. Theodorahad all the hallmarks of being the next such hit, but circumstance was to intervene—rather improbably in the form of an earthquake which drove much of Handel’s audience from the city. This masterpiece therefore took a little longer to develop—an oratorio that has a different feel than many of his other works—more contemplative, personal and reflective, and with music of great serenity and beauty. It was rumored to be one of the composer’s favorite works, and on hearing its spellbinding arias—brought to life here by countertenor Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, tenor Thomas Cooley, bass-baritone Dashon Burton, and soprano Julie Roset in the title role—we are very sure you’ll leave thinking the sam.

Handel’s Theodora

We honor Handel’s intended ‘wow factor’ of Radamisto with a new staging by Christophe Gayral, a familiar name in some of Europe’s most prestigious opera houses, giving us a fitting close to our 21/22 season.

Handel’s Radamisto

England and France might be separated by just 20 miles of water, but their musical traditions are utterly distinct, and never more so than during the Baroque era, as demonstrated by this concert showcasing music from each. Skip Sempé makes his guest conducting debut with PBO.

From Versailles to the English Court

Mozart was a composer who loved to test boundaries, and in his Symphony No. 38 you hear him pushing the orchestra of the day to the limit, expanding the horizons of the symphony. It’s a veritable smorgasbord of invention, a riot of creativity.

Mozart the Radical

Bach’s B Minor Mass is one of the towering achievements of the Baroque, and indeed of all classical music. It is the summation of Bach’s creative output, but likely never performed in his lifetime.

Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale

11 - 13 Apr, 2024

Romantic Radiance

1 - 3 Feb, 2024

Double Espresso

7 - 9 Dec, 2023

Six Centuries Of Christmas

Dec 4, 2023

Songs Of Solomon

Dec 2, 2023

Dido & Aeneas

Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra & Chorale

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