COMPASSION is Trio Lucaria's latest concert program. They follow a thematic line and tell a story spanning over several centuries from early music into contemporary times and do so most fittingly in the remains of a former site of practicing belief, Tartus Cathedral.
Philipp Friedrich Böddecker wrote a virtuoso piece for Bassoon over the pleading for compassion of a peasant girl from the 15th century. She begs her parents to not be send away into a monastery, a common practice in families, when there was too many mouths to feed at home. With this piece Trio Lucaria starts into the concert and introduces the theorbo to the audience, adding sound and color of a period instrument into this period music.
We continue with the festive Ciaccona by Tarquinio Merula. Following the peasant girls‘ pleading, imagine she might have been successful in avoiding being sent away and instead celebrates with other inhabitants of her village.
The audience will get reminded of the pleading girl, presented by the theorbo solo in Partite variate sopra La Monica by Alessandro Piccinini.
Have it been the parents dancing at the village and the girl has indeed been sent to a monastery and has to do a lot of praying? Prayers may be spoken or sung, in common they all have mantra-like specific rhythms and tonalities. Les Folies d‘Espagne by Marin Marais present such reoccurring meditational and yet exciting and changing patterns. According to traditional practice we add variations to the piece ourselves which through growingly intense use of contemporary playing techniques lead over into the world premiere of Ardo Ran Varres‘ Year of Compassion, dedicated to the Dalai Laama‘s 90th birthday.
PERFORMERS
Trio Lucaria, consisting of Kristin Müürsepp (flute/piccolo), Priit Peterson (guitar/theorbo), and Stefan Heinrich Kerstan (bassoon), has been playing together since the summer of 2022. Their first concert took place on July 1st at St. John’s Church in Tartu, followed by performances at Alatskivi Castle, Vastseliina Church, and the German Cultural Institute in Tartu.
In the summer of 2023, they performed at wind instrument festivals in Otepää and Võru, and in 2024, they played at Knorring Manor in Tartu.
Although the ensemble consists of bass, harmony, and melody instruments, no original music has previously been composed specifically for this combination. Nevertheless, they have put together programs that allow them to fully explore each instrument’s potential, and when necessary, they adapt and arrange music themselves to highlight their best qualities.
University of Tartu Museum • Lossi 25, 51003 Tartu, Tartu maakond, Estonia
