Monteverdi, Pallavicino, Guerrero... | A Princely Wedding: The Renaissance in Music
Saison
2026/2027
The Renaissance in Music
In 1599, European capitals were alive with the rhythm of princely celebrations, public processions, and grand musical ceremonies. With this monumental performance, Le Concert Spirituel revives the sonic energy of the European Renaissance: an immersive celebration where choirs, brass, drums, violins, and voices emerge from every corner to bring the extraordinary festive power of 16th-century music back to life.
Distribution
Le Concert Spirituel, choir and orchestra, conducted by Hervé Niquet
Program
Procession through the city
Thanksgiving at the Cathedral
Claudio Monteverdi | Adoramus te for 5 parts
Costanzo Festa | Counterpoints from the 125 variations on ‘La Spagna’
Francisco Guerrero | Te Deum
Giovanni Gabrieli | Angelus ad pastores for 12 voices and double choir
Benedetto Pallavicino | Jubilate Deo
Giovanni Gastoldi | Magnificat for 8 voices
Philippe Rogier | Opera omnia II: Verbum caro for 12 voices and triple choir - Laudate Dominum for 8 voices
Still dance
Lorenzo Allegri | Primo ballo della Notte d’Amore – excerpts – instrumental
Giovanni Gastoldi | Balletti for 5 voices – excerpts (Amor vittorioso, L’Innamorato) – vocal
Michael Praetorius | Galliard for 5 voices from Terpsichore – Courante "Battaglia" - instrumental (trumpets)
Peter Philips | Deo Gratias – Pavan Passamezzo for 6 voices - instrumental (alternating instrument consorts)
Tielman Susato | La Mourisque, from La Danseyre – instrumental tutti
John Bennett | The Elves Dance
Lodovico Grossi da Viadana | La Fiorentina, from Ballo del Gran Duca
Production
Le Concert Spirituel
Duration
1h30
No intermission
Photo credit
Additional information
What if, for one evening, we could recapture the spirit of the great Renaissance festivals?
At the end of the 16th century, Europe celebrated its sovereigns with a burst of music, dance, and ceremony, turning entire cities into theaters. Street processions, trumpet fanfares, monumental choirs, and popular balls: music spilled far beyond the concert hall, filling public spaces and uniting entire populations in a shared fervor.
With this spectacular production, Le Concert Spirituel recreates the spirit of these grandiose celebrations by bringing together the great music of the European Renaissance. Monteverdi, Gabrieli, Praetorius, Guerrero, and Gastoldi engage in a dialogue with dance songs, flamboyant polyphony, and open-air music in an immense, festive journey.
The show unfolds in three parts: a procession led by drums and fifes, a majestic sacred ceremony performed by 32 singers and 32 instrumentalists, and finally, a grand Renaissance ball where different instrument families respond to one another in an explosion of rhythm and color.
Shawms, sackbuts, cornetts, natural trumpets, Renaissance violins, regals, and historical drums reconstructed specifically for this project: everything here works to bring a lost soundscape back to life. More than just a concert, this production offers a true immersion into the festive Europe of the Renaissance, blending collective power, instrumental virtuosity, and popular joy.
Under the direction of Hervé Niquet, this musical fresco brings together Le Concert Spirituel with several of Europe's finest specialists in early instruments. It is a vibrant, spectacular, and deeply embodied celebration, where music returns to its primary purpose: to gather, to amaze, and to move an entire audience.