Vivaldi’s ‘The Four Seasons’

One of the world’s greatest Baroque orchestras, Europa Galante is joined by the winner of the Rising Talent award at the 2022 International Opera Awards, Nardus Williams, in our season opening concert. Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons features across the programme, in its 300th year, with Handel and Purcell arias interspersed between each movement. 

The evening celebrates the sound of nature and inventively explores how composers depict the seasons within their music. Europa Galante will be led by founder and conductor-violinist Fabio Biondi, described by The Guardian as a virtuoso ‘beyond reproach’. This is a welcome return for the ensemble to Oxford after they first performed with us back in 2002, and whose interpretation of The Four Seasons has garnered almost mythical status. 

This event is part of the Everything is Connected Season organised by the University of Oxford’s Humanities Cultural Programme. 

‘Europa Galante is acknowledged as among the world’s best. Their performances and recordings are notable as much for their flare and vivid originality as fir their meticulous attention to interpretative detail and precision of the ensemble.‘ The Guardian

‘[Nardus Williams] sings her two arias with a knockout combination of melting vulnerability and lustrous ardour. In the sort of show that will gather pep as the run continues, she is already fully launched.‘ The Times

 

ABOUT THE ARTISTS

Hailed as ‘one to listen out for’ (The Guardian), Soprano Nardus Williams is establishing herself as one of the most exciting British singers of her generation. Winner of the Rising Talent award at the 2022 International Opera Awards, upcoming highlights of the 2022/23 season include a return to the Glyndebourne tour as Countess Le Nozze di Figaro after resounding success this summer, and also to the festival as Adina L’elisir d’amore. She will make her house and role debut as Helena A Midsummer Night’s Dream for Opéra de Rouen Normandie, and on the concert platform, return to the London Handel Festival, Wigmore Hall, perform a programme of Handel with the Dunedin Consort, and Tippett A Child of Our Time with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra. A former English National Opera Harewood Artist, Williams was recently nominated for the Times Breakthrough Award at The South Bank Sky Arts Awards 2022 and in the Young Artist category for the RPS Awards 2023. Read Nardus’ full biography on Intermusica’s website.

Europa Galante was formed in 1989 out of the desire of its artistic director, Fabio Biondi, to create an Italian instrumental ensemble for interpretations of the great baroque and classical repertoire on period instruments. The discovery of ancient music was then exclusively the domain of musicians of northern Europe, and the need for a uniquely Italian review of this repertoire was at the heart of the formation of the ensemble. 

Europa Galante achieved great success early on with the release of its first recording of the concertos of Antonio Vivaldi (Cini Award in Venice, Choc de la Musique in France). From the outset, the ensemble was praised for its ability to “bring something truly new and vital to repertoires that are often performed, illuminating paths already widely traced with intimate modulations, articulated with expressiveness” (Gramophone). 

In the following years, the new and unique character of Europa Galante was underlined by a growing list of important recording awards, including numerous Diapason d’Or and Choc du Monde de la Musique prizes, several BBC editor’s choices, RTL awards and three Grammy Awards nominations. Read the full biography on their website.