Apollo’s Cabinet: Opening concert at York Early Music Christmas Festival 2025
YORK Early Music Christmas Festival swung straight into high gear in a seasonal knockabout, with a tenor and five Baroque players reacting to audience whims.
Apollo’s Cabinet specialises in such laid-back shows. This was the Christmas edition of its “jukebox menu”, with several courses offered to us on arrival.
In the event, we began with an instrumental medley, which set a breezy tone. Thereafter, we trod a fairly well-trodden path in a haphazard manner, depending on audience choices: Bach and Handel each featured twice and there were eating and drinking ballads from Purcell and Locke.
Otherwise, apart from an anonymous “battle” between two recorders, the audience was actively involved in a sing-along, or “Slow Set”, of four carols.
Rory Carver used his tenor intelligently in an aria from the New Year’s Day section of Bach’s Christmas Oratorio. He also prefaced Lowell Mason’s Antioch (aka Joy To The World, based on Handel) with a smooth account of Comfort Ye from Messiah.
The recorder players, Teresa Wrann and Thomas Pickering, the latter doubling on harpsichord and flute, dazzled in their duel, while also enabling Bach’s sheep to graze safely. It was all good fun, but punters may have wondered whether their £23 was truly well spent on such trifles.
Review by Martin Dreyer
York Early Music Christmas Festival continues until December 14. For full details and tickets, go to: ncem.co.uk. Box office: 01904 658338.