The Sempervivum concert features Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber as its central figure, (doubly celebrated in 2024, 380 years after his birth and 320 years after his death) but also includes works by iconic Baroque composers such as Henry Purcell and Dieterich Buxtehude. The concert is also an homage to the "newness of old music", on the very birthday of the most important musician of the musical baroque - Johann Sebastian Bach. Information provided by violinist Mira Glodeanu and harpsichordist Raluca Enea in the Wednesday, 20^th of March 2024 edition of Perpetuum mobile.

We are talking about an important day, tomorrow, March 21^st, the European Day of Old Music, which you will celebrate on stage, but before all this I would like to talk about how the collaboration started, last winter was the first meeting between the violinist Mira Glodeanu and the Sempre ensemble, which you coordinate. How did this collaboration begin?

Raluca Enea: On the occasion of the Old Music Festival in 2023, we decided to do a concert program together with Mira to explore a little bit other areas of old music than the ones we had explored until that moment, and she agreed to join us. It was a great collaboration. We just soaked it up. I think she felt well assimilated into our group, into the Sempre ensemble. Since that was the beginning of our collaboration, we thought it would be very useful to continue in the same spirit for the 21^st of March 2024, which, as you said, is International Old Music Day.

The recital on November 11^th, I remind those at home, will be broadcast on Radio Romania Muzical, tomorrow, starting at 19.00. We have a special edition, Radio Romania Musical Concerts. Mira Glodeanu, what have you prepared for tomorrow evening at the Auditorium?

European music from the 17th century, two composers I am particularly fond of, Purcell and Biber, fundamental to early music. Purcell, who we know for his opera music, and Biber who is not so well known, but not so far from us, was born in Bohemia and composed absolutely extraordinary and extravagant music for the late 17th century, a real violinist, who composed for violinists and for those who liked music, without singing. It is instrumental music, almost 70% of his work. For the Sempre ensemble, an ensemble that is very dear to me, indeed they have also assimilated me and I them, an ensemble in which there are fellow students and musical education, so to speak, and Raluca at the harpsichord, cello, double bass, from time to time and singing and organ or lute. It is an ensemble that I found absolutely perfect for staging this music, perhaps not so much listened to by the audience in Bucharest, in Romania. Tomorrow we combined instrumental pieces with excerpts from Purcell's works, a small kaleidoscope from the late 17th century, in which European music is heavily represented. There are English accents, there are German accents, there are French accents, even if they are not called that and in the interpretation of a Romanian group we hope to delight the listeners who will come tomorrow.

It's time to talk about the ensemble Sempre. A little over three years, I was talking just before the interview started, in December you will celebrate four years of existence. It's a good time to remember the members of the Sempre ensemble.

Raluca Enea: Yes, it's almost four years since our foundation in 2024. The members of the ensemble are Rafael Butaru, Melinda Beres and Mircea Grigore Lazăr on violins. Tamara Dica is on violin, Lazar Zsombor on cello, Istvan Csata on viola da gamba and double bass, on lute we have two colleagues with whom we collaborate, Andrej Jovanic from Belgrade and the young Filip Zsombor from Miercurea Ciuc and me on harpsichord. Of course, soprano Cristina Vasilache, who has been a member since the beginning of the ensemble.

So we have the full list of performers for tomorrow night's concert at the Auditorium of the National Art Museum of Romania. Purcell in the programme of tomorrow night's Semper Vivum concert by violinist Mira Glodeanu and the Sempre ensemble. This concert will take place on the 21^st of March. Raluca Enea and Mira Glodeanu, I would ask each of you to tell us about the importance - from your point of view - of this day, 21^st of March, the European Day of Early Music, especially when we talk about the Romanian music scene.

Raluca Enea: For me, for example, this day is synonymous with the acceptance of the Bucharest Old Music Festival into REMA, the European Network of Old Music. This happened nine years ago and that was the first time we organized the Old Music Day. Probably for the audience in Bucharest this fact is already common, because we have been organizing it annually for almost 10 years and we are happy for the fact that the audience has increased from one year to another. Of course, the festival has contributed to this, and this celebration of old music is a kind of annex to the festival. We're glad that together with more than 200 other colleagues from Europe we will be able to evolve in this field of old music at the same time, because there are more than 200 concerts in Europe at the same time.

Mira Glodeanu: From my point of view it is a great joy, a great emotion. It is the first time I celebrate this day in Bucharest, in Romania. More than 30 years ago, when I started playing early music, I would not have thought that such a celebration of such a magnitude could be held in Bucharest. It was Bach's birthday, it was the day of spring, it's already a very meaningful date. For me, who chose to celebrate this early music every working day, so to speak, to be able to do it with dear colleagues in my country, it is a great emotion and I find it extremely important, because I have seen that there are activities in Cluj and in other large centres in Romania. It seems to me a symbolic European role, fully assumed by our artists and it is a great satisfaction.

Raluca Enea, earlier you were telling me about the audience that has grown over time. Apart from the number, how has the old music audience in Bucharest changed? I'm thinking of ages, social categories, in all aspects? What does this audience look like now?

First of all I will tell you, let's say, an anecdote, but one that I actually lived. At the first edition of the festival, in 2006, a participant in the audience, at one of the concerts, asked us when the Elvis concert was, because people understood by early music, some people translated oldies, old music or something like that, that we wanted to revive that period of the 60s and 70s, something like that, and then I realized that people actually perceived this quite wrongly. I don't want to say that we were the only ones to play this role in Bucharest, but people began to understand what was happening with this music, where it came from, what period it came from, and they began to get to know them, not only Bach and Handel, who were already established here, they studied music history at the Conservatory, but also other composers, such as Rameau, Francois Couperin, this wonderful Biber or Buxtehude or Purcell, the latter, let's say, would be known from the opera, there have been productions and of course there are institutions like the French Cultural Institute or the Goethe Institute who have guests, plus the George Enescu International Festival which had a fairly substantial early music component, especially opera, but the fact that the Acis and Galatea presented by Les Arts Florissants, two editions of the festival ago the hall was full says a lot about this phenomenon and about the fact that people have become more cultured, more educated, have started to invest in equipment to listen to this kind of music and gradually, gradually I think they are catching up with the European current.

This is good news, it's good news, the audience is changing and they are coming with you to these events. It's time for invitations for tomorrow night's concert. How do they sound? Are tickets still available at the moment? Where can those interested find out more information, is there a website available?

Raluca Enea: Tickets are sold through the Eventim network, online, and more details can be found on the Bucharest Early Music Festival page, generally on Facebook, on the Old Music group, but of course there are other means of communication.

Mira Glodeanu, an invitation for tomorrow night for those who are interested, what are your thoughts on coming to this concert?

With thoughts of spring and renewal, because of the music we are presenting, maybe some will be a first for certain ears, others may bring back memories of songs, songs that we have in our genes I would say, even if we didn't know it was Purcell and we were left with a chaconne tune and suddenly recognize it: Ah, so his name was Purcell and it ties together all the unseen threads from our childhood Conservatory music classes or wherever we might have had them. We're preparing for tonight as a night of celebration, on stage and with our audience. To the audience that we discovered in November I have a special invitation, in the sense that this music that we put on stage, without sets and without costumes, is an extremely theatrical music, with words or without, in which everyone can find a small invitation to life, to love, to the evening, to enchantment, a rebirth simply on this spring day.

An invitation for a festive evening tomorrow at the Auditorium Hall of the National Art Museum of Romania, violinist Mira Glodeanu, harpsichordist Raluca Enea, thank you for your presence in Perpetuum mobile, good luck.