Florid Sentiments - Arias and chamber music by Handel, Corelli, and Babell

George Frideric Handel’s Italian pastoral chamber cantatas (a burgeoning genre of the time) composed for private concert performances for the aristocracy, exhibit the very expressive Italian style of dramatic vocal writing.

The poetic texts invariably derive from mythology, and concern the topic of love and desire in an idealised Arcadian landscape. This concert features the most ravishing of the genre, Mi Palpita il cor, paired with some of his sacred and secular arias, along with Arcangelo Corelli’s highly decorated third Violin Sonatas for an evening of music-making to transport you to Arcadia.

This concert is part of the Instruments of Time and Truth Summer Concert Series 2022, and is generously supported by both John Osborn and Continuo Foundation.

Instruments of Time and Truth are Oxford’s own period instrument orchestra, presenting world-class performances of Baroque and Classical music in Oxford and around the UK.