We are delighted to be joining up with The Friends of Cambridge Early Music for our first joint event of 2019 and to welcoming back Dan Tidhar.
This event is part of FOCEM’s Insight programme.
Doors will open for pre-talk drinks at 5.15 with the talk taking place between 6.00 and 7.00.
Everyone is welcome to attend this free event, but please ensure you book by contacting friends@cambridgeearlymusic.org.
About the event
Early keyboard instruments which involve plucking of strings (sometimes simply referred to as “plucked keyboard instruments”) come in many different sizes and shapes, which vary according to time, geography, musical style and function. This lecture-recital will focus on three distinguished members of this family of instruments: the virginals, the Italian single-manual harpsichord and the French double-manual harpsichord. Dan will present fine examples of these instruments, outline the structural and acoustic similarities and differences between them, and demonstrate how these affect the particular idioms of composition and performance for which the individual instruments are particularly suitable. The musical examples will include excerpts from the Fitzwilliam Virginal Book, early English and Italian Baroque as well as high Baroque German and French harpsichord music.
Dan Tidhar
Dan Tidhar combines a busy performance schedule as harpsichordist and organist with research in musicology, teaching, and collecting and restoring of historical keyboard instruments. Dan is active as a recitalist and continuo player with various ensembles, both locally and internationally. His continuo playing can be heard on several recently released CDs e.g. with the Chelys Consort of Viols (BIS) and Syrinx Winds (Resonus). He has performed in numerous festivals (including Stour Music, Southwell Music Festival, Roman River Festival, Regensburg Alte Music, and many more), and is a regular member of various ensembles including Syrinx Winds, Concentus7, and the early keyboard duo with Francis Knights. Dan is a well-published researcher in various fields, and mainly in computational analysis of early music.
At Cambridge, Dan is a Research Associate at Wolfson College, a member of the Faculty of Music and the Centre for Music and Science, and has recently started teaching harpsichord as an Associate Lecturer at Anglia Ruskin University. Dan maintains a modest collection of historical keyboard instruments and provides restoration, maintenance, and tuning services to similar instruments in Cambridge and further afield.