Course for strings and string chamber music

On “Historical Performance Practice” (Gerhart Darmstadt)

“My generation, as well as that of our most important teachers, learned and taught a rule based form of ‘historical performance practice’ which, in its early stages, sought to address nearly every musical question through reference to historical sources, thereby developing a new style of historically informed performance. Over the decades, this approach became increasingly differentiated. Biographical and regional contexts, backgrounds, and specific aspects were explored in greater depth. In the process, it became ever clearer that a fully reconstructed, ‘authentic’ performance of a work is neither possible nor even desirable. Instead, one may strive to correspond to the meaning, form, and spirit of the music.

Today, the various camps of so called ‘modern’ and ‘early’ music have moved so closely toward one another that a certain arbitrariness has emerged, sometimes serving the business more than the music itself.

What I wish for today is a new, ‘spiritual’ performance practice that seeks to realize the ideals, contents, and visions of past generations and to make them fruitful for our own time in the sense of a comprehensive cultivation of empathy and, in a certain way, also healing.”

Gerhart Darmstadt

(born 1952) studied with Mirko Dorner, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, and Anner Bylsma. As a soloist, including performances on the Arpeggione and the Viole d’Orphée, as well as a chamber musician, continuo and orchestral player, conductor, and profound expert on music of the 17th to 19th centuries, he has established an international reputation as an exceptional musician and scholar.