The Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment and St Stephen Walbrook join forces to present a three-part festival of music commemorating the church’s architect, Sir Christopher Wren.
St Stephen Walbrook was the first church exclusively designed by Sir Christopher Wren of the 52 that were built by him following the Great Fire of London in 1666. Its design became the blueprint for the great dome of St Paul's Cathedral, completed three decades later. Key to the major restoration of the church completed in 1987 is Henry Moore's marble altar placed centrally under the Dome.
The festival offers a snapshot of musical life at the point of Wren’s death, three hundred years ago in 1723. This was the year of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons and the year Bach was appointed cantor in Leipzig; it was also a time of rebirth for London following outbreaks of bubonic plague and the Great Fire, with Henry Purcell at its forefront.
On Friday 21 April, Kati Debretzeni, one of the OAE’s leaders. is the soloist in Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. The Guardian writes of her, ‘Debretzeni’s joyful, spirited playing, precise but free, gives endless pleasure.’ Vivaldi’s cycle of four violin concertos, each depicting a season with visceral energy, is believed to have been completed in 1723, the year of Sir Christopher Wren’s death. The four violin concertos of The Four Seasons will be interspersed with readings and spoken programme notes by the performers.