Frederick II — flute sonatas | concert on historical instruments

King, strategist, reformer, but also flutist and composer. Frederick II, called the Great, was one of the most characteristic figures of eighteenth-century Europe. Music held a special place in his life — he played the transverse flute, composed and surrounded himself with outstanding musicians of his era.

After assuming the throne, Frederick II regularly organized evening chamber concerts in his residences, including at the Sanssouci Palace in Potsdam, where a special concert room — the Concert-Zimmer was located in the king's private apartments. During musical evenings, the monarch stood alone at the desk with a flute and was accompanied by outstanding court musicians, among them Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Franz Benda or Johann Joachim Quantz.

During the concert we will hear selected flute sonatas of Frederick II, revealing the lesser-known, more personal face of the Prussian monarch. Among the next pieces we will tell about his great passion for music and composing, concerts organized at the court and the artists he surrounded himself with.

We will also look at the transformations that took place in eighteenth-century music, where emotions, mood swings and individual experience gained increasing importance. The chamber sonatas will take us into the world of court artistic life and will allow us to look at the times of Daniel Chodowiecki from a different perspective — through music, one of the most important forms of artistic and intellectual expression of the Enlightenment era.

They will play: Maja Miro — historical flute Maksym Zajaczkiewicz — harpsichord Weronika Kulpa — historical cello