This program pays homage to the effects of the Thirty Years War on composition and culture in seventeenth-century Germany. The program illuminates the music of lesser-known wartime and postwar composers: the refugees Heinrich Grimm and Andreas Hammerschmidt; the British immigrant William Brade and his close multi-instrumentalist colleague Johann Schop; the controversial Johann Rosenmüller; Johann Vierdanck, star musician of the Dresden court; and Johann Rudolph Ahle, whose style directly influenced Bach and the subsequent high Baroque. All of these composers are intimately connected: driven from city to city by sickness and war, brought together by extraordinary musical abilities, their music creates a bright path that leads us through and beyond a period of impenetrable darkness.

Past Performances:
Twin Cities Early Music Festival (2018)
Hamilton Performing Arts Series, Clinton, NY (2022)