Angelica Kauffmann (1741–1807). Ariadne Abandoned by Theseus on Naxos, 1774, oil on canvas. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Harris Masterson III/Bridgeman Images
Angelica Kauffmann (1741–1807). Ariadne Abandoned by Theseus on Naxos, 1774, oil on canvas. Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, Texas. Gift of Mr. and Mrs. Harris Masterson III/Bridgeman Images
The festival season’s exploration of the music of Joseph Haydn begins on a celebratory note, connecting the father of the Classical style with the Baroque era’s greatest master. Concert Program I culminates in Johann Sebastian Bach’s beloved Schweigt stille, plaudert nicht (Be Still, Stop Chattering)—popularly known as the Coffee Cantata—a lighthearted rumination on addiction to caffeine, and a forebear to Haydn’s own secular cantatas. The program also features two sterling examples of the eighteenth-century concerto: the Cello Concerto in A Major by Sebastian’s son Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach and Haydn’s luminescent First Violin Concerto.