Accademia dell’Arcadia

Accademia dell’Arcadia grew from several informal ensembles from the Conservatories of Utrecht and The Hague, but was officially formed in 2008 upon a mutual desire to perform early music on historical instruments to a high standard, while combining humour, experimentation and treatises.  Accademia dell’Arcadia is especially dedicated to breathing new life into works wich are long familiar, and combining these with rediscovered works. Each member of the group adds their own identity to the finished result, which is made particularly clear by the combination of solo and ensemble works within each programme.

Their name is taken from the famous literary academy founded in Rome in 1690, where distinguished members of the society met assuming the pose of nymphs and shepherds to discuss literary and exchange verses, and where private music was performed. Musicians like Corelli, Pasquini, A. Scarlatti (called there Terpandro), and later Gasparini, Sarro and the singer Andrea Adami where accepted as honorary members.

The name also links to the arcadian implications of the recorder, especially in the context of vocal music.

Domestic bliss

music for private use in the 18th century

[4 musicians]

Veneziana

an 18th century concerto

[5 musicians]

contact

who said...

"[Beethoven] went in his usual (I might say, ill-bred) manner to the instrument as if half-pushed, picket up the violoncello part of Steibelt's quintet in passing, placed it (intentionally?) upon the stand upside down and with one finger drummed out a theme of the first few measures. Insulted and angered, he improvised in such a manner that Steibelt left the room before he finished, would never again meet him and, indeed, made it a condition that Beethoven should not be invited before accepting an offer."

F.W. Wegeler & F. Ries, Biographische Notizen über Ludwig van Beethoven (Koblenz, 1838)

"[...] the king [Charles II of Spain] eagerly asked me if I had heard Matheuchi sing, when he would come, and if he was impertinent or not, and as if there were no army in the world, nor Milanese state, completely forgot such matters, but this is not surprising given that all his ministers, or most of them, have had the same experience [...]"

Letter of Carlos Felipe Spinola y Colonna to the duke of Medinaceli (1698)

"I was in St Alban's Abbey and I was intrigued: they were building a new organ and I went up to - I suppose it must have been - the verger and I said, 'Is the organ baroque?' And he said, 'No, it's in perfectly good order.'"

John Tavener, The Music of Silence, A Composer's Testament (Faber ISBN 0571200885)

"The Second Harpsichordist will go only to the last rehearsal, sending the Third One to the previous, who won't read more high Clef than Soprano, trying to play without using the Thumbs, don't follow the Numbers, play always the Sixth, don't meet up with the Master, and close all the second Parts of Arias with major thirds, etc. etc. etc."

Benedetto Marcello, Il teatro alla moda (1720)