Ambronay Festival
Encyclopedia
The Ambronay Festival is a French opera festival and early music festival
.
The festival has been running in October for 30 years and previously produced recordings with labels such as the Auvidis label. 7 of 14 early recordings were with Jordi Savall
. Since 2005 the Festival has been issuing recordings on its own label. More recently Leonardo García Alarcón has been a regular performer and recording artist.
The main venue is the Benedictine Abbey Notre-Dame d'Ambronay of the village of Ambronay
. The abbey has an exceptional acoustic In the abbey performing spaces are: Tour Dauphine, Chapiteau, Abbatiale. Other venues include the Théâtre de Bourg-en-Bresse, Monastery of Brou, also at Bourg-en-Bresse
, Théâtre des Augustins in Montluel
, the Abbaye Saint-Martin d'Ainay
, Lyon, and Belley Cathedral.
There is a theme for the festival each year:
Early music festivals
Early music festivals is a generic term for musical festivals focused on music before Beethoven, or including Historically informed performance of later works...
.
The festival has been running in October for 30 years and previously produced recordings with labels such as the Auvidis label. 7 of 14 early recordings were with Jordi Savall
Jordi Savall
Jordi Savall i Bernadet is a Catalan viol player, conductor and composer. He has been one of the major figures in the field of Western early music since the 1970s, largely responsible for bringing the viol back to life on the stage...
. Since 2005 the Festival has been issuing recordings on its own label. More recently Leonardo García Alarcón has been a regular performer and recording artist.
The main venue is the Benedictine Abbey Notre-Dame d'Ambronay of the village of Ambronay
Ambronay
Ambronay is a commune in the Ain department in the Rhône-Alpes region in eastern France. It is situated some north of Ambérieu-en-Bugey.-Abbey:...
. The abbey has an exceptional acoustic In the abbey performing spaces are: Tour Dauphine, Chapiteau, Abbatiale. Other venues include the Théâtre de Bourg-en-Bresse, Monastery of Brou, also at Bourg-en-Bresse
Bourg-en-Bresse
Bourg-en-Bresse is a commune in eastern France, capital of the Ain department, and was capital of the former province of Bresse . It is located north-northeast of Lyon.The inhabitants of Bourg-en-Bresse are known as Burgiens.-Geography:...
, Théâtre des Augustins in Montluel
Montluel
Montluel is a commune in the Ain department in eastern France.It is situated on the outskirts of Lyon. The inhabitants are known as Montluistes.-Population:-Personalities:*Claude André , Catholic Bishop of Quimper...
, the Abbaye Saint-Martin d'Ainay
Ainay
Ainay is an area within the Presqu'ile district in the 2nd arrondissement of Lyon, to the south of Place Bellecour and the north of Perrache. It is best known for its Romanesque church, the Basilica of Saint-Martin d'Ainay. A middle-class area in the city centre, its buildings mainly date to the...
, Lyon, and Belley Cathedral.
There is a theme for the festival each year:
- 2005 - including premieres of works by Francisco António de AlmeidaFrancisco António de AlmeidaFrancisco António de Almeida was a Portuguese composer and organist.From 1722 to 1726 he was a royal scholar in Rome. In 1724, Pier Leone Ghezzi drew his caricature, describing him as "a young but excellent composer of concertos and church music who sang with extreme taste"...
and Pedro Antonio AvondanoPedro Antonio AvondanoPedro Antonio Avondano was an Italian composer at the Portuguese court. He is mainly noted, like Domenico Scarlatti for harpsichord sonatas and sacred music.-Works, editions and recordings:* comic opera Il mondo della luna...
Ensemble Divino Sospiro, dir. Enrico Onofri. Tonos, cantadas et xácaras du Baroque espagnol by Los Musicos de su Alteza dir. Luis Antonio González - 2006 - including Marco MarazzoliMarco MarazzoliMarco Marazzoli was an Italian priest and composer.-Early life:Born at Parma, Marazzoli received early training as a priest, and was ordained around 1625. He moved to Rome in 1626, and entered the service of Cardinal Antonio Barberini...
La Vita Humana Le Poème Harmonique dir. Vincent Dumestre. - 2007 - including Robert CarverRobert Carver (composer)Robert Carver was a Scottish Renaissance monk and composer of Christian sacred music.He spent much of his life at Scone Abbey in Perthshire and is regarded as Scotland's greatest sixteenth-century composer. He is best known for his sacred choral music, of which there are five surviving masses and...
, Ludus Modalis, dir. Bruno Boterf - 2008 - Women composers - including works by Johann Adolf Hasse, Akadêmia, Françoise Lasserre
- 2009 - celebrated 30 years by inviting the founders of the baroque movement. Including William ChristieWilliam Christie (musician)William Lincoln Christie is an American-born French conductor and harpsichordist. He is noted as a specialist in baroque repertoire and as the founder of the ensemble Les Arts Florissants....
directing Handel's Susanna. - 2010 - celebrated the younger generation: Marco Mencoboni and Cantar Lontano, Fabio BiondiFabio BiondiFabio Biondi is an Italian violinist and conductor.Born in Palermo, Sicily, Biondi began his international career at the age of 12 playing a concerto with the RAI Symphony Orchestra. When he was 16, he performed Bach's violin concertos at the Musikverein in Vienna...
, Manfredo Kraemer, Jean-Christophe SpinosiJean-Christophe SpinosiJean-Christophe Spinosi is a French conductor and violinist, the founder of Quatuor Matheus , a group that later grew into Ensemble Matheus. He is especially well-known for his interpretation of the instrumental and vocal music of the Baroque, most notably the operas of Vivaldi...
, and those still younger such as Geoffroy Jourdain and the Les Cris de Paris, Héloïse Gaillard and Ensemble Amarillis, Emmanuel Bardon and Canticum Novum, Sébastien d'Hérin (harpsichordist) and Leonardo García Alarcón.