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<docID>340953</docID>
<postdate>2025-03-24 10:27:21</postdate>
<headline>Delightful plucking and scratching from Apeiron Baroque</headline>
<body><p><img class="size-full wp-image-340955" src="https://citynews.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/20250323-Apeiron-Baroque-10.jpg" alt="" width="900" height="600" /></p>
<caption>Apeiron Baroque. Photo: Dalice Trost</caption>
<p><span class="kicker-line">Music / Pluckers and Scratchers, Apeiron Baroque. At Wesley Uniting Church, Â March 23. Reviewed by <strong>GRAHAM McDONALD</strong>.</span></p>
<p><strong>One of the things I do enjoy about an Apeiron Baroque concert is that I know I will have never heard of at least two-thirds of the composers. </strong></p>
<p>In this concert it was more like 80 per cent, including Adam Jarzebski, a major figure in the early Polish baroque and a couple of English musicians active at the court of Charles I. This is not a complaint, but merely an admiration of the work John Ma and Marie Searles must do in tracking down these forgotten gems of the Baroque.</p>
<p>For this concert Searles and Ma were joined by young Canberra-based cellist James Monro and two musicians from Melbourne. Hannah Lane plays an Italian triple harp and Laura Vaughan a viola da gamba. These two unusual instruments added quite different tonal elements to the ensemble.</p>
<p>For the opening work, a sonata by 17<sup>th</sup> century German composer Dietrich Becker, the harp and cello playing plucked bass lines along with rumbling harpsichord from Searles with the melody swapping between Maâ€™s violin and the gamba.</p>
<p>The triple harp and the gamba each had short solo pieces, with the harp demonstrating its quite different sound compared to a modern concert harp.</p>
<p>Several other works showcased the visitors, with the harp featured in selections from two harp consorts by English composer William Lawes and the gamba in a sonata by German Johan Ruhe. For this work Ma switched to a viola and the nasal quality of the two lower-register instruments blended in an interesting and beguiling way.</p>
<p>The concert was cleverly programmed with a mix of wonderfully obscure music by mostly forgotten 17<sup>th</sup> and 18<sup>th</sup> century musicians. There was music for the entire ensemble, sometimes just three or four along with a solo spot for the interstate visitors. Monroâ€™s cello shone in a trio sonata by Richard Jones, the lead swapping between the cello and violin with just the harpsichord adding continuo.</p>
<p>A jaunty movement from a Buxtehude sonata to finish sent the near capacity audience on its way with a collective smile on their faces.</p>
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