Programme
Domenico Scarlatti (1685-1757)
Sonata in G minor, K. 347
Sonata in G major, K. 348
Sonata in F#, K. 318
Sonata in F#, K. 319
George Frideric Handel (1685-1759)
Suite III in D minor (1720)
Prélude - Allemande - Courante - Aria con variazioni - Presto
Domenico Scarlatti
Sonatas in D major, K. 490 - 491 - 492
George Frideric Handel
Chaconne in G major (1735)
Performer
Mahan Esfahani
Programme Notes
In one of those great anecdotes from the historical record that enliven often dry commentary on early eighteenth-century music, the 1708 meeting in a Venetian palazzo of two fabulously talented young foreigners — the Neapolitan Domenico Scarlatti, “all dressed in black,” and a flamboyant Saxon named George Frideric Handel — stands out as a rare meeting between two figures whose music has formed such an integral part of our modern performing repertoire so as to have become otherwise depersonalised in our common cultural vocabulary. We know them otherwise as established figures either in a somewhat bloated national context (Handel for sure) or as a terrifying name to see on one’s music which tells us the contents are to be greatly challenging (Scarlatti), but the truth is that these were once young men, and young innovators at that.
Of Scarlatti’s “happy freaks” (in the words of Charles Burney) perhaps too much is said already, but we are still in a general sense quite unaware that he evoked at the keyboard the same sense of theatre and of the voice. That Handel did more than to merely ape, albeit skilfully, the commonplaces of his time is likewise ignored. What Scarlatti did with shaping and colouration at the harpsichord, Handel did with transforming and indeed problematising suite and sonata form into something greater than the sum of its parts.
Biography
Mahan Esfahani has made it his life's mission to rehabilitate the harpsichord in the mainstream of concert instruments, and to that end his creative programming and work in commissioning new works have drawn the attention of critics and audiences across Europe, Asia, and North America. He was the first and only harpsichordist to be a BBC New Generation Artist (2008-2010), a Borletti-Buitoni prize winner (2009), and a nominee for Gramophone's Artist of the Year (2014, 2015, and 2017). In 2022, he became the youngest recipient of the Wigmore Medal, in recognition of his significant contribution and longstanding relationship with the Hall.
His work for the harpsichord has resulted in recitals in most of the major series and concert halls, amongst them London's Wigmore Hall and Barbican Centre, Oji Hall in Tokyo, the Forbidden City Concert Hall in Beijing, Shanghai Concert Hall, Carnegie Hall in NYC, Sydney Opera House, Melbourne Recital Centre, Los Angeles's Walt Disney Concert Hall, Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival, Berlin Konzerthaus, Zurich Tonhalle, Wiener Konzerthaus, San Francisco Performances, the 92nd St Y, Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, Cologne Philharmonie, Edinburgh International Festival, Aspen Music Festival, Aldeburgh Festival, Madrid's Fundación Juan March, Bergen Festival, Festival Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Al Bustan Festival in Beirut, Jerusalem Arts Festival, and the Leipzig Bach Festival, and concerto appearances with the Chicago Symphony, Ensemble Modern, BBC Symphony, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Seattle Symphony, Melbourne Symphony, Auckland Philharmonia, Czech Radio Symphony, Orquesta de Navarra, Malta Philharmonic, Orchestra La Scintilla, Aarhus Symphony, Montreal’s Les Violons du Roy, Hamburg Symphony, Munich Chamber Orchestra, Britten Sinfonia, the Royal Northern Sinfonia, and Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, with whom he was an artistic partner for 2016-2018.
His richly-varied discography includes seven critically-acclaimed recordings for Hyperion and Deutsche Grammophon – garnering one Gramophone award, two BBC Music Magazine Awards, a Diapason d’Or and ‘Choc de Classica’ in France, and two ICMAs.