Maestro Arts tours B’Rock Orchestra to South Korea and Japan

Maestro Arts is to tour visionary period-performance orchestra B'Rock to South Korea and Japan this spring, performing Handel's La Bellezza ravveduta nel trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno with René Jacobs, and giving the Korean premiere of Anna Meredith's ANNO.

The orchestra brings the Handel to Seoul Arts Center (29 March), Tongyeong International Music Festival (2 April) and ends its tour with it at Tokyo Opera City (4 April). 

As part of a three-concert artistic residency at Tongyeong International Music Festival, the orchestra also performs Meredith's ANNO, which combines Vivaldi's Four Seasons with new works composed for string orchestra, harpsichord and electronics (31 March & 1 April). 

The Guardian reviewed ANNO in 2023, writing: 'Meredith's approach is not simply a matter of taking Vivaldi clubbing: it's playful but not irreverent, occasionally sentimental... At its most elemental, the music's progress from the light of the spring solstice to that of dark winter seemed to connect to the primeval energies associated with those turnings of the year. Among the most striking interventions were the thunder of summer and the glacial wintry chill, where brittle harpsichord combined with electronically generated sounds to colour the aural landscape.'

The tour marks B'Rock Orchestra's debut in Korea and Jacobs' first visit to Japan since 1994.