Holland Baroque & Wu Wei

(Cancelled) Holland Baroque likes to share the stage with playful musicians. Composer and improvisor Wu Wei is such a musician.

Wu Wei can do everything with the sheng, the Chinese mouth organ that represents three thousand years of Chinese music culture and that is a miracle of harmony, melody and rhythmic possibilities.Why does a baroque orchestra meet a sheng player?

The actual encounter of orchestra and musical guest always takes place in the field of a shared sound world. Holland Baroque and Wu Wei connect the beautiful sheng sound with baroque music and hear that old traditions and exotic instruments can produce new stories. The result is a concert of new and old compositions that tells one thing in particular: Music is alive and continues to be so when creative spirits leap upon music that still has a huge power of expressiveness today. Whether that is music from Western or Eastern cultures, composed or improvised music is no longer relevant.

“Sheng means hope and hope is life,” says Wu Wei. He is a modern musician who carries out an ancient tradition. It’s no coincidence that on Wu Wei’s sheng case a sticker is stuck with his motto: “Gutes bleibt, neues kommt”. A motto that Holland Baroque can relate to very wel. Cherish what needs to be preserved and be open to new sounds. Because Holland Baroque thinks old music does not exist. The music is only finished when you play it.We look forward to meeting with this incomparable sound virtuoso.

The CD ‘Silk Baroque’ is the first CD in the new collaboration between Holland Baroque and the international record label Pentatone. Check our webshop for more information.

Program
Purcell, Bach, Vivaldi, Telemann, Rameau, Rebel, Leclair l’Ainné and Wu Wei.