Sir John Eliot Gardiner / The Constellation Choir & Orchestra

Christmas music by Marc-Antoine Charpentier and Johann Sebastian Bach

This concert has already taken place! 17 | 41 | 76 | 112 | 135
This concert has already taken place! 17 | 41 | 76 | 112 | 135
Sir John Eliot Gardiner
Sir John Eliot Gardiner © Sim Canetty-Clarke
  • Doors open 19:45

  • Start 20:45

  • Interval

  • End ca. 23:08

Rise up joyfully!

With his newly founded ensembles The Constellation Choir & Orchestra, Sir John Eliot Gardiner brings beautiful baroque music by Johann Sebastian Bach and Marc-Antoine Charpentier to the Elbphilharmonie on the second weekend of Advent. It is the ensembles’ inaugural performance and with Gardiner on the rostrum, the ensembles can draw on the period performance pioneer’s decades of expertise.

In his midnight mass »Messe de minuit«, composed around 1694, Marc-Antoine Charpentier elicits delightful rhythms and timbres from ten old French Christmas carols and so continues on the country’s tradition of celebrating the good news with dance-like vigour and great cheerfulness. With the two cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach that follow, composed for the Christmas seasons in 1725 and 1731 in Leipzig’s Thomaskirche, Gardiner and his ensembles present the composer whom the conductor once described as the most important of all for him.

The Constellation Orchestra & Choir are the flagship groups of the Springhead Constellation founded by Sir John Eliot Gardiner. The conductor aims to realise ambitious, multidisciplinary concert projects and go on tour with them worldwide. What could be a better motto for this concert than the title of the Bach cantata »Schwingt freudig euch empor« (Rise up joyfully)!

Performers

The Constellation Orchestra

The Constellation Choir

Marie Luise Werneburg soprano

Eline Welle mezzo-soprano

Peter Davoren tenor

Alex Ashworth bass

conductor Sir John Eliot Gardiner

Programme

Johann Sebastian Bach
Schwingt freudig euch empor BWV 36

Marc-Antoine Charpentier
Kyrie, Gloria und Credo / aus: Messe de minuit à 4 voix, flûtes et violons, pour Noël

– Interval –

Marc-Antoine Charpentier
Sanctus e Benedictus und Agnus Dei / aus: Messe de minuit à 4 voix, flûtes et violons, pour Noël

Johann Sebastian Bach
Unser Mund sei voll Lachens, BWV 110


Encore:

/ Melchior Vulpius
Es ist ein Ros entsprungen

Promoter: HamburgMusik

From the Mediatheque : Videos, Podcasts, Articles

Elbphilharmonie Talk with Sir John Eliot Gardiner

Organic farmer and Bach expert: the conductor on his personal story with the Mass in B Minor and his second job as a successful organic farmer.

Stories with the hashtag #EarlyMusic

Concert streams, interviews, articles – exciting contributions about early music are available in the media library.

Stories with the hashtag #Christmas

Christmas carols to sing along to for the whole family and stories about the festivities from the Elbphilharmonie

During your visit

Elbphilharmonie Plaza

A public viewing platform on the 8th floor of the Elbphilharmonie

More about the Plaza

Food and Drink

Before the concert and in the interval

Find out more

Coughing, clapping, chatting

Tips for your concert visit

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