Boxing Day Baroque By Candlelight, St Martin-in-the-Fields

There’s something about baroque music and Christmas that just fits together, whether in the icy squalls of Vivaldi’s Winter, the annual ritual of Handel’s Messiah or the reassuring warmth of Pachelbel’s Canon in D. So could there be a better way to spend Boxing Day evening than a concert in early eighteenth century St Martin-in-the-Fields, listening to these classics and many more beside? The Belmont Ensemble will preside over the blissful eve, joined by violinists Helen Davies and Pippa Harris and illuminated only by candlelight.
The Belmont Ensemble of London was founded in 1991 by director and conductor Peter G Dyson. It instantly established itself as one of the capital’s finest chamber orchestras, and the in-house performers at St Martin-in-the-Fields. Their fortnightly concerts are amongst the most visited in London. The ensemble is largely drawn from exceptional young musicians between their time at conservatoire and in a full-time orchestra, and provides an important service in helping such players to secure a position. Helen Davies is the leader of the Trafalgar Sinfonia, and a guest principal of the Belmont. In 2000, she was awarded a Churchill Trust Fellowship to fund her studies.
The concert will open vivaciously with Vivaldi’s Autumn and Winter, before Corelli’s meltingly beautiful Christmas Concerto is played in full. Then follows a collection of beloved fixtures – Bach’s Air on the G String, Mozart’s Eine kleine Nachtmusik, Pachelbel’s Canon – mixed with seasonally themed masterworks. Vivaldi’s Christmas Violin Concerto is full of his signature keening violin parts, and bursts with exuberance. The little-known Giuseppe Torelli’s own Christmas Concerto is a mellower proposition, which evokes the snow-doused landscapes of midwinter. Two pieces from Handel complete the programme – the Overture and Christmas Sinfonia from Messiah and the Arrival of the Queen of Sheba from Solomon. This promises to be an evening of unrelenting magnificence.