(LEFT) Dušan Balarin  (RIGHT) Daniel Swenberg

(PRINCETON, NJ) -- The Dryden Ensemble returns with its new artistic director, Daniel Swenberg, in a program entitled "A 26-Course Feast: Baroque Lute Duets" on Sunday, February 16, 2025 at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation (50 Cherry Hill Road) in Princeton. Showtime is 4:00pm. Admission is free, though donations will be gratefully accepted.

Lutenists Daniel Swenberg and Dušan Balarin will perform 17th- and 18th-century duets for the Baroque lute. While performances of Baroque lute duets are extremely rare, there is a significant repertoire from the early 17th century to the close of the 18th. Our program begins and ends with lavish galant duets from the center of the lute’s final flourishing—the court of Wilhelmine, Margrave of Bayreuth (Fredrick the Great’s sister). Wilhelmine was herself an accomplished lutenist and student of the great Silvius Leopold Weiss, and set out to create a mini-Versailles in Bayreuth.

Telemann (often under the pseudonym/anagram Signor Melante) spent a formative year in Sorau, Poland in 1705. He was particularly inspired by the gypsy fiddlers of the area. His Partita in g minor is found in a large collection of lute duets now in Warsaw. A manuscript in Poznan, Poland features a collection of English music, from which our Purcell Ground has been reconstructed. Duets by Frenchmen Francois DuFault and Robert DeVisée will be performed, as well as two sonatas for Baroque mandolino (smallest member of the lute family) by Conti and Sammartini, rounding out the program with delightful variety.

The season continues at the Princeton Theological Seminary Chapel on Sunday, March 16 at 4:00pm with "The Marvelous Mr. Meusel," a program of 18th-century courtly entertainments for flute, bass viol, lute, and harpsichord, featuring music by Couperin Bach, Dieupart, and Meusel. On Saturday, April 19 at 4:00pm the ensemble presents "Baroque Passion: Music for Holy Week," featuring soprano Clara Rottsolk in sacred arias by Bach and Ferrandini for obbligato violas da gamba and lute.

The Dryden Ensemble is a not-for-profit organization under section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code and a registered charity in New Jersey. For information on how to become a supporter or sponsor of the Dryden Ensemble visit: drydenensemble.org.