Block6 The Hague is a recorder ensemble with 6 players from different background and origin.
Players studied at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague and come from Korea, France, Japan, Netherlands and Switzerland bringing an appealing diversity.
Daniel Brüggen, who is a consort specialist and member of the Loeki Stardust Quartet, coaches the group.
The repertoire consists of mainly renaissance music and is performed on copies of recorders that were in use during this period.
In sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, recorder was used mainly as a consort instrument. Musicians tried to imitate the a cappella choir with homogeneous instrumental consort. The wide bore of the renaissance recorder makes the sound deeper and it has rich overtones. Which is nice to play in ensemble and mixed with voice or other instruments as well. The instruments we are using are quite special. They were made together as a family by one maker. That makes us easy to mix the sounds and helps the chords to be in pure. This consort recorders have a range of an octave and a sixth with “Ganassi “fingerings. Silvestro Ganassi (1492 - ca.1550) who was an Italian musician and composer also mentioned the choosing and combination of the instruments as well. In his recorder method,“Fontegara(1535)”, he suggested to use three different instruments by fifth intervals for one form of a consort: Alto in G, Tenor in C and Bass in F. However we need more because of six part music and responding a lot of possibilities for instrumental combination. Our consort set contains: Soprano in C, Alto in G and F, Tenor in C, Basset in G and F, Bass in C and F, etc.
Playing 6 recorders together is a challenging and enriching experience.
It can bring about magical moments, which we want to share with you.
Ornella Balhi is a French recorder player. She first studied at the "Conservatoire national de region" in Lyon with Xavier Janot and Susi Möhlmeier where she obtained her Diplôme
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