Teatro della Pergola

Concert bill

We’d only been in Florence for two days and we saw a poster for a concert that would take place a day later on Saturday. The concert was at 4pm at Teatro della Pergola, a small theater that is a short walk from our apartment.

There are two major concert halls in Florence, the modern opera house and symphony concert hall on the other side of Florence and an historic smaller theater near our apartment that was built in the mid-1600s. The concert we wanted to attend was at the smaller hall and was (thankfully) scheduled for the late afternoon.

Entrance to the theater

When one of us was a student in Florence the program leaders passed along a number of tickets to concerts at the big symphony hall and the historic, smaller theater. Since then a new opera house/symphony hall has been built and has recently opened. The smaller theater, Teatro della Pergola, was built in the mid-1600s and continues to reflect the era that it was built. The lobby is grand and the main theater has many box seats and lots of red velvet. 

Lobby (source)

The concert was an all Bach choral concert. If you know us, you know that the combination of Bach and choral would be appealing to us. We met in a choir and sang lots of Bach under the direction of an inspirational conductor including the first piece on the concert bill, Lobet den Herrn (Praise the Lord). 

The concert was performed by the Swedish Radio Chorus. Sixteen singers slowly processed onto the stage with a conductor, an organist, and a cellist. The singing had great forward motion, controlled energy, and a wonderful lightness. The performance was terrific.

Concert hall (source)

Here’s a Youtube clip of a performance of Lobet den Herrn.

The rest of the concert brought more old favorites and was a great tonic for a pair of tired travelers.