The Brook Street Band is an award winning specialist in eighteenth century repertoire that takes its name from the London street where George Frideric Handel lived and composed for most of his working life. Its various prizes include BBC Radio 3 Young Artists' Forum and the Byrne Award, given by the Handel Institute for Handel scholarship.

It was formed in 1995 by the baroque cellist Tatty Theo with the aim of exploring lesser-known works by Handel and his English and European contemporaries, and interpreting more familiar works in the light of recent scholarship. The Brook Street Band performs small to large scale repertoire ranging from intimate chamber music to concerts with double orchestra and choir.

The Brook Street Band has performed extensively at Festivals around Britain, including teaching and performing residencies at the Dartington International Summer School. The Band also gives concerts and runs education projects for the Handel House Museum in London.

The Brook Street Band also believes in commissioning contemporary works for period instruments. Those who have written for the group include the celebrated composer and educationalist David Bedford and renowned composer and vocalist Errollyn Wallen. One of the Band's most notable contemporary projects has been working with Errollyn on a song cycle The Queen and I, initiated for 2003 in anticipation of the 400th anniversary of the death of Elizabeth I.

The Italian Connection

The Trio Sonata was one of the most popular forms of instrumental chamber music throughout Europe. It originated in Italy and was established by the middle of the seventeenth century. The title suggests three players, but in fact a trio sonata features four; two melodic lines and a bass line (known as the continuo) performed by a cello or similar instrument and a harpsichord, organ or plucked continuo instrument (such as a theorbo or archlute) filling out the harmony. This programme includes a chaconne, ciaccona, passacaille or passacaglia (as it was variously known) by Handel, Corelli and Leclair. This was one of the more popular dances in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; the melodic material is built on top of a short repeated harmonic pattern, which provides the framework for a series of sometimes virtuosic variations. Of the composers featured here Corelli and Geminiani were born in Italy. Leclair and Handel both had extensive musical experience there and all four composed in the Italian style, known for its fiery virtuosity, passion, and dramatic contrasts. Italian influence spread far and wide - many of the most successful musicians working throughout Europe came from Italy. London in particular had a large contingent of Italian musicians who were attracted by good pay and working conditions. A great proportion of the musicians in Handel's orchestras and many of his opera singers, for example, were Italians.

Handel composed two sets of trio sonatas during his lifetime. VI Sonatas for Two Violins, Two Oboes, or Two Flutes and Basso Continuo Opus 2 was first published in London c. 1730, at a time when Handel was very much involved with Italian opera at the Royal Academy. The second set Seven Sonatas or Trios for Two Violins or German Flutes with a Thorough Bass for the Harpsichord or Violoncello Opus 5 (published in 1739) is less well-known and is infrequently performed. Unlike the Opus 2 trio sonatas, which were based on the typical Italian four movement da chiesa (church) pattern, the Opus 5 sonatas are rather a series of seven loosely assembled dance suites, very much in the da camera (chamber) mould. Both sets of trio sonatas include music previously used elsewhere; popular tunes from opera, oratorio and a Chandos Anthem appear, and this would have made the music familiar to London audiences. The trio sonatas would never have been performed in a formal concert setting, intended as they were to be played at home, or as 'fillers' during the intervals of opera performances, or in the London pleasure gardens, such as Vauxhall, Marylebone and Ranelagh.

This version of Handel's famous Water Music probably dates from 1717-19 (and is thought to predate the more familiar orchestral version), when Handel was working for the Duke of Chandos at Cannons (modern-day Edgware in London). This date is given due to the fact that there are no viola parts present, and it is known that there were no viola players at Cannons at this time due to the Duke's limited instrumental resources. It is known as the Oxford Water Music as it was found copied into part-books now housed in Oxford's Christchurch library. It was identified and first edited for publication by Handel scholar Donald Burrows. This performing edition is by the Band's cellist and director Tatty Theo. The individual movements of the Water Music were probably written at different times and adapted by Handel to suit his various requirements. The scoring of the Oxford Water Music is unsuitable for outdoor performance, unlike fuller orchestral versions of the work as the following 1717 report states:

'...Next to the King's barge was that of the musicians, about 50 in number, who played an all kinds if instruments, to wit trumpets, horns, hautboys, bassoons, German flutes, French flutes, violins and basses...The music had been composed specially by the famous Handel, a native of Halle, and His Majesty's principal Court Composer. His Majesty approved of it so greatly that he caused it to be repeated three times in all...'

Leclair is widely considered to be the founder of the French violin school, responsible for fusing the Italian baroque sonata style, with written-out ornamentation and notes inégales representing refined French taste. He was famed for his virtuosic capabilities and brilliant ability at performing multiple stops, and was widely traveled both as a student and performer. His violin sonatas were at the time described as '...[appearing] at first a kind of algebra capable of rebuffing the most courageous musicians...'. This particularly virtuosic trio sonata, owing much to Handel and various Italian influences, dates from 1737. Through his appointment as Ordinaire de la Musique du Roi to Louis XV in 1733, Leclair was at the centre of musical life in Paris. His life was extremely colourful as was his death - he was murdered in his home in a seedy area of Paris, probably killed by his own nephew, a jealous rival.

Corelli was a pioneering force in seventeenth and eighteenth century music, particularly in Italy, but also further a-field in the rest of Northern Europe. He composed four different sets of trio sonatas for two violins and continuo, which were published in Rome in 1681, 1685, 1689 and 1694. His compositional output was not vast, although his impact both during his lifetime and well into the eighteenth century was tremendous; developments in printing technology meant that his music was reprinted many times and was therefore widely available throughout Europe. This number of reprints was not matched until Haydn. Corelli was a virtuoso violinist and directed and played in many of the orchestras in Rome. Hawkins described him as being 'remarkable for the mildness of his temper and the modesty of his deportment', and he was considered to be a 'learned, elegant and pathetic' player even if occasionally 'it was usual for his countenance to be distorted, his eyes to become as red as fire, and his eyeballs to roll as if in an agony'.

Geminiani's Sonatas of three Parts for two Violins a Violoncello and Thorough Bass are his own arrangement of his Twelve Sonatas Opus 1 for violin and continuo, published in London c. 1714, shortly after his arrival from Italy. The Opus 1 sonatas were most probably composed in either Rome or Naples, and no doubt heavily influenced by Corelli's violin sonatas. Geminiani describes the works as 'musical diversions...for the violin that are intended for the studious delight of those who are not contented by the harmonious sound of that instrument alone...'

Geminiani was a major composer, player, teacher and theorist, forming a vital part of London's musical scene from 1714 until his departure for Dublin in 1759, where he died in 1762. As music in the eighteenth century had a shorter shelf-life composers were able to use their best tunes many times over and in these sonatas Geminiani is following the tradition of the day in reworking and 'reheating' as much musical material as possible.

(c) Tatty Theo, The Brook Street Band 2003