Marc-Antoine Charpentier (1643–1704) was one of the greatest seventeenth-century composers, to be ranked with Monteverdi, Schütz and Purcell. After studying in Italy, he became singer and composer for the elite group of musicians in the household of the Duchesse de Guise, Louis XIV’s first cousin; following her death in 1688, he became music master to the Jesuits in Paris and then in the Sainte-Chapelle at court. In this special concert we bring together a cross-section of his most memorable music, sacred and secular. It ranges from a wonderful extended motet, ‘Annunciate superi’, for six-part choir, two treble viols and continuo, written for the Guise musicians, to the famous setting of the Te Deum, probably written in August 1692 to celebrate the French victory at Steenkerque and famous today for the use of its Prelude as the Eurovision theme tune. Charpentier’s secular music is represented mainly by a superb scene, set in the underworld, from his unfinished opera La Descente d’Orphée aux enfers (1686–7).

Tickets £20 (reserved) & £15 (unreserved)
HALF-PRICE TICKETS FOR THOSE UNDER 30