C. F. Abel Concert: Polish Discoveries

Join us for a special event to celebrate Sonia Wronkowska’s extradinary musical discovery. The evening will begin at Gainsborough’s House with three pre-concert talks and then at The Quaker Meeting House for the first performance outside London of the recently discovered music by eighteenth century composers Abel and Lidel.

 

Sonia Wronkowska made the discovery of at least 23 unknown viola da gamba sonatas by Carl Frederick Abel (1723-87) from the collection of Count Joachim Carl von Maltzan (1733-1817), now at the University of Poznań. Maltzan was Prussian ambassador in London from 1776 to 1782 and seems to have been an amateur viola da gamba player, one of the circle of pupils and admirers of Abel that also included Thomas Gainsborough. What makes the discovery so exciting is that the new sonatas are mostly mature, sophisticated and virtuoso works, composed for Abel himself to play in his celebrated London concerts; those known hitherto are nearly all undemanding teaching pieces. Abel was the greatest viola da gamba player of his day, and was a supremely elegant and accomplished composer, to be ranked with his friends John Christian Bach and the young Mozart.

 

Mark Caudle, who will lead the concert, divides his time as a viola da gamba virtuoso between East Anglia and Poland, and has appeared at Suffolk Villages Festival many times, most recently at this year’s Festival in Monteverdi’s Coronation of Poppea.

 

Pre-concert talks 5.30pm, Gainsborough’s House

Gainsborough and Abel
Mark Bills

Abel and the Viola da Gamba
Peter Holman

An Exciting Discovery
Sonia Wronkowska

Concert 7pm, The Quaker Meeting House, Sudbury

Mark Caudle, Viola da Gamba
Teresa Kamińska, Cello