Orchestra of the 18th Century
Encyclopedia
The Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century is a Dutch early music
orchestra
. Frans Brüggen
and Sieuwert Verster co-founded the orchestra in 1981.
The orchestra consists of about 60 members from many different countries, who all play on period instruments. The group was formed as a collective
, so all orchestra members and the conductor receive equal shares of concert earnings. The orchestra does not audition its members, but receives them through word-of-mouth invitations.
The orchestra has toured widely both in Europe and America and recorded extensively with Philips Classics, including symphonies of Beethoven
, Haydn
and Mozart
Early music
Early music is generally understood as comprising all music from the earliest times up to the Renaissance. However, today this term has come to include "any music for which a historically appropriate style of performance must be reconstructed on the basis of surviving scores, treatises,...
orchestra
Orchestra
An orchestra is a sizable instrumental ensemble that contains sections of string, brass, woodwind, and percussion instruments. The term orchestra derives from the Greek ορχήστρα, the name for the area in front of an ancient Greek stage reserved for the Greek chorus...
. Frans Brüggen
Frans Brüggen
Frans Brüggen is a well-known Dutch conductor, recorder player and baroque flautist.-Biography:Brüggen studied recorder and flute at the Amsterdam Muzieklyceum. He also studied musicology at the University of Amsterdam. In 1955, at the age of 21, he was appointed professor at the Royal...
and Sieuwert Verster co-founded the orchestra in 1981.
The orchestra consists of about 60 members from many different countries, who all play on period instruments. The group was formed as a collective
Musical collective
Musical collective is a phrase used to describe a group of musicians in which membership is flexible and creative control is shared. Such entities have transitioned from the traditional hierarchical configuration that features either a frontman , or a plurality of band members in tension for...
, so all orchestra members and the conductor receive equal shares of concert earnings. The orchestra does not audition its members, but receives them through word-of-mouth invitations.
The orchestra has toured widely both in Europe and America and recorded extensively with Philips Classics, including symphonies of Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven was a German composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential composers of all time.Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of...
, Haydn
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn , known as Joseph Haydn , was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the Classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these forms...
and Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart , baptismal name Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart , was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. He composed over 600 works, many acknowledged as pinnacles of symphonic, concertante, chamber, piano, operatic, and choral music...