In the mood for some harpsichord music?

marian-leora-harpsicordTwo musicians will be performing on a historic dual harpsichord tuned in a historic way next month.

Harpsichordists Marian Thomas and Leora Nauta will perform as part of the Westport Center for the Arts’ Brown Bag Concert Series at 12:10 p.m., Friday, Sept. 19, at Immanuel Lutheran, 1700 Westport Road,  Kansas City, Missouri.

Here’s more from the Westport Center for the Arts:

The pair’s performance from the first volume of Johann Sebastian Bach’s “Well-Tempered Clavier” will open the 21st season of the Brown Bag Concert Series.  The concert is the sixth in a series of seven concerts where Thomas, Nauta and harpsichordist Rebecca Bell will perform all of the preludes and fugues from each of the two Well-Tempered Clavier volumes.

The harpsichord will be tuned to the historic Werckmeister III temperament, a tuning that many scholars believe is similar to the one Bach employed in the 18th century. The temperament allows each key to produce a distinctive sound, unlike the tuning of a modern piano.

Thomas and Nauta will be performing on a French double-manual harpsichord in the style of Paul Taskin, a great builder of the 18th century. Thomas carefully constructed the harpsichord from a Frank Hubbard kit in 1983, after working in the Hubbard Workshop for a year.

Thomas was the music director and organist at Westport Presbyterian Church from 1998 to 2009. She is also the founder and director of the Brown Bag Concert series, now in its 21st season.

Nauta is the organist at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church Concert.

Admission is free, but donations are welcome. A complimentary reception will be held immediately after the concert.

Financial assistance for this project has been provided by the Missouri Arts Council, a state agency, and the ArtsKC-Regional Arts Council.
Westport  Center for the Arts was founded in 2006 to support community artists and the arts. In addition to the monthly Brown Bag Concerts, WCA presents Readers’ Theater, Kids Team Up for Art and other special programs.

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