The Olympic gods themselves will be watching over the closing ceremony of the 27th edition of the Summer Festivities of Early Music. Mythology provided poets and composers with a rich repertoire of dramatic characters, symbols, archetypal motifs, and supernatural events that lent themselves to emotionally powerful musical interpretations. These universal and timeless stories explore human virtues, vices, passions, joyful events, and tragic fates…

The final concert comprises opera arias by George Frideric Handel and Henry Purcell, as well as rarely performed secular cantatas by Johann Sebastian Bach (commissioned by the University of Leipzig in honour of the Saxon royal family and the university’s professors). The audience will have the opportunity to admire inventive melodies, bold harmonies, colourful instrumentation, lively rhythms, and brilliant virtuosity. The evening will resound with the unique timbre of German bass-baritone Andreas Wolf, the enchanting flute playing of Jana Semerádová, and the interpretive mastery of the festival’s ensemble in residence, Collegium Marianum.