Alfonso Sebastián

As part of its organ concert series, the Auditorio de Tenerife presents ‘Handeliana II‘, featuring organist Alfonso Sebastián alongside the Orquesta Barroca de Tenerife.

We continue our exploration of the music of George Frederic Handel as part of this season’s organ concert series at the Auditorio de Tenerife. In this second programme, Handeliana II, we delve further into his creative world through a carefully curated selection of concertante and orchestral works performed by the Orquesta Barroca de Tenerife.

Conducted by Alfonso Sebastián, who also appears as soloist, the concert opens with the overture to the opera Partenope (HWV 27), a work that reveals the theatrical elegance and majesty characteristic of Handel’s style. At the heart of the programme are three organ concertos from Opp. 4 and 7 (HWV 290, 291 and 310), in which Handel displays his extraordinary melodic invention and instrumental virtuosity, together with a subtle balance of brilliance, improvisatory freedom and lyricism. Conceived for the composer himself to perform during the intervals of his operas and oratorios in eighteenth-century London, these works reveal an immediate and dynamic connection with the audience.

The programme is completed by the Oboe Concerto in G minor (HWV 287), which introduces a striking contrast in timbre, and the Trio Sonata in G major, Op. 5 No. 4 (HWV 399), showcasing the richness of Handel’s chamber music and the refinement of his contrapuntal writing.

Performed on period instruments, the concert offers a contemporary perspective on Baroque sound through the distinctive qualities of a cutting-edge organ, whose transparent and flexible tonal palette lends renewed clarity to the dialogue between soloist and ensemble, bringing Handel’s rhythmic vitality, rhetorical power and expressive richness vividly to the fore.

The Orquesta Barroca de Tenerife, led by concertmaster Adrián Linares, completes the line-up in a programme that reaffirms the enduring relevance and communicative power of Handel’s music in the twenty-first century.