If it ain’t baroque, don’t fix it*

 If it ain’t baroque, don’t fix it*

 - Mark van Vuuren

Unreliable sources insist the word Spring derives from the Latin “Awake”. I concur.

Three horribly cold and unnecessarily long months finally done. Along with it goes the daily dose of sick building syndrome, crowded lifts divided between the sneezers and the non-breathers, and the now-monotonous taste of gluwein.

The mould of Winter has melted. The Big Sleep is over.

The purpose of what you are reading is to highlight the pleasures of baroque music in Spring. Any given Spring Sunday with a picnic basket containing a collection of wines, cheese and bikkies, somewhere in the great outdoors (including front lawns) is quite incomplete without the gel of humanity: baroque music.

Baroque mirrors Spring with its grandiose openings, optimism, sprightly pace, busy cacophony of activities and enthusiastic endeavour. The following recommended collection of baroque compositions is presented in alphabetical order:

Boccherini: Minuet

Handel: Hallelujah chorus
Handel: The arrival of the Queen of Sheba
Handel: Water music – Alla hornpipe
Handel: Zadok the priest

JS Bach: Air ‘on the G string’
JS Bach: Brandenburg concerto No.2 – allegro assai
JS Bach: Brandenburg concerto No.3 – allegro
JS Bach: Orchestral suite no.2 - Badinerie

Telemann: Rejouissance

Vivaldi: Concero for lute and two violins – allegro giusto
Vivaldi: Flute concerto in D – Il gardellino
Vivaldi: The four seasons –allegro (Spring) – Nigel Kennedy recording, of course; listen out for the spinet.

As an extra, Albinoni’s Adagio is included; although solemn it is still baroque, and quite magnificent.

In conclusion, one can talk of passion or one can experience passion; Spring is here, the time is nigh (no pun intended, perhaps).
- fin -

* Title used with kind permission from Albert de Klerk