Richard Duke and Stradivari violins at the NPG 3 6 2011

Alexander Pope, Hester Thrale, Dr Johnson, watch Julian Perkins at work. NPG 3-6-2011

Abel Adagio NPG 3-6 2011

Audience NPG 3 6 2011

National Portrait Gallery Concert 2, June 3rd 2011. PSS with Julian Perkins. Handel, Babell, Tartini, Mozart, Pugnanini, Abel, Sacchini....

REPORTING Back 

Only Connect (Concert 2)

Friday June 3rd 630 pm

National Portrait Gallery

Peter Sheppard Skærved – Violins (Antonio Stradivari 1698 ‘Joachim’ & Richard Duke ca. 1750)

The concert was designed to reflect the interchange between German, Italian, and British culture in the 19th century. The choice of violins for the evening reflected that. It was in the second half of 18th century that the great Cremonese violins first started to make their impact in London. Charles Burney reported trying to buy an Amati in a coffee house in Italy in 1770. The Richard Duke violin was most likely made in the 1750s in one of the various Duke workshops which tended to be in the Lambs Conduit street area. The room that this concert took place in was graced by the Zoffany group picture of the Sharp Family. There is a violin on the floor of the left hand side of this picture. Held next to the picture, the Duke violin appeared very similar.

NPG L169; The Sharp Family by Johan Joseph Zoffany

Julian Perkins-Harpsichord- After Carlo Grimaldi, by Mark Ransom and Clare Hammitt 1991

Karl Friedrich Abel                    D Major Sonata (MS) Adagio

(1725-1787)

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart        B Flat Major Sonata (K10) Menuetto

                                                (dedicated to Queen Charlotte)

 Antonio Sacchini                        Aria Non cerchi innammorarsi

(1734-1786)

 Gaetano Pugnani                        B Flat Major Sonata Op 7 No 1 Andante con Variazioni

(1731-1798)                               (dedicated to the Duchess of Marlborough)

 Giuseppe Tartini                        G minor Sonata Didone Abandonata

(1692-1770)                              

 Giuseppe Tartini                        E minor ‘Piccola Sonata’

(1692-1770)

 John Christopher Smith  ‘Lesson in A’ (from ‘Six Suits’ Op3)

(1712-1795)                               Allegro, Larghetto, Vivace

 George Frederick Handel           Aria Lascia ch’io pianga from Rinaldo – arranged by-

(1685-1759)

William Babell (or Babel)   as: Suits of Harpsichord or Spinet Lessons (1717 & 1718)

(1689/1690- 1723)

 In 1785, Thomas Jefferson to  James Madison: ‘You see that I am an enthusiast on the subject of the arts. But it is an enthusiasm of which I am not ashamed, as its object is to improve the taste of my countrymen, to increase their reputation, to reconcile to them the respect of the world and procure them its praise.’ September 20/1785