Baroque Is Back, New As Ever

When Doug Myers was a music student, he dreamed of becoming “the Maurice André of the French Horn.” André, the master French trumpeter who died earlier this year, almost singlehandedly brought much of the Baroque repertoire to prominence in the 1960s and 1970s through his use of the piccolo trumpet, a diminutive instrument invented at the turn of the 20th century that plays an octave above the standard trumpet — allowing it to soar into the higher realms of Bach, Handel and other Baroque composers. While he is too modest to admit it, Myers has come darn near to realizing his dream. Not just a trumpeter, he is one of a relatively small number of brass players to use a piccolo French horn (which he also calls a “corno da caccia,” or hunting horn), a much more recent invention, thus opening up a vast new range of possibilities in Baroque music. Myers says he has probably played 20 to 30 premières of horn concertos on the petite instrument. He is somewhat mystified by why it took horn players so long to catch up to their trumpet brethren in making an instrument that could tackle the demands of the Baroque. “Horn players are just more arrogant,” he speculates. With his ensemble, the New Baroque Soloists, Myers maintains a full schedule of concerts, often working year-round with his colleagues on new arrangements of classic Baroque repertoire, and teaches in his hometown, New Fairfield, CT. Beginning next week, on July 18, the group will play a series of four Wednesday afternoon Baroque concerts at St. John’s Episcopal Church in Salisbury, CT. The name of Myers’ ensemble, and the performance methods and instruments they have chosen, invite us to consider some interesting questions about Baroque performance practices, both in that time and today. For instance, Myers’ musicians forgo the “period instruments” that have become standard issue for most Baroque performers (although most are modern-built replicas of those instruments, of course). But for Myers, his approach in no way lacks authenticity. “We’re doing exactly what people did in Baroque times. on the best instruments of their time,” he insists. Similarly, the freedom with which Myers rearranges versions of original compositions mirrors Baroque practices, which were often quite flexible. The July 18 concert opens with what Myers calls a “festive” piece, a Bach “overture” for two horns and strings, with timpani — Myers’ arrangement of the opening movement of Bach’s Cantata BWV 79. The percussion “is something never found in a chamber group,” Myers notes with more than a hint of pride. Next is a concerto for two horns by František Xaver Pokorný, a Czech composer of the Classical period, and a piece, Myers says, that has never before been performed in the United States; then a trio sonata by Johann Joachim Quantz, a late-Baroque German composer and flutist who happened to be the court musician to Frederick the Great. (And, wouldn’t you know it, the Prussian monarch was himself a fine musician and composer.) Also on the program are two solo works: a Bach fugue for solo organ, performed by Ben Woodward, organist at St. John’s in Fulham, England, who plays with the New Baroque Soloists; and the Second Suite for solo cello by Bach. The last work is another fanfare-like arrangement of a Bach cantata movement from BWV 172. The members of the group, besides Myers and Woodward, are Joel Pitchon, violin; Ronald Feldman, cello; Ellen Katz Willner, oboe; Gregory Hayes, organ and harpsichord; Yuko Naito, violin; and Greg Whitaker, trumpet and horn. Future concerts include harp virtuoso Jacquelyn Bartlett, the second week, in works by Vivaldi and Handel, and a performance of Handel’s famous “Water Music” at the final concert. The Summer Baroque Concerts at St. John’s Church in Salisbury take place Wednesdays, July 18 and 25 and Aug. 1 and 8, at 5 p.m. For information, call 860-435-9290.