Sunday

5 March 2023

5:15 P.M.

Andrew Wang

violin

David Hughes

organ

Heinrich Ignaz Franz von Biber

(1644–1704)

Rosary Sonatas

Nos. 6–10

The Rosary Sonatas are now Biber’s best known composition, though they had been lost for over two hundred years shortly after their composition in about 1676. The entire work comprises fifteen sonatas, each corresponding to one of the mysteries of the Rosary, plus a sixteenth movement, a towering Passacaglia for solo violin. The Rosenkranzsonaten are also known as the Copper-Engraving Sonatas: in the orignal score, each movement is preceded not by a title, but rather by an engraving. As a Lenten devotion, we will be playing sonatas nos. 6 through 10, which correspond of course to the Sorrowful Mysteries. Biber’s inventiveness in writing for the violin is here coupled with both a lively faith and a vivid imagination of the events of the Passion.

Andrew Wang is a retired American concert violinist. He began the violin at the age of five and gave his first public performance at the age of seven. His formative teachers have included the late Josephine McAndrews, Fredell Lack, Margaret Pardee, and Emmanuel Borok. He received invaluable instruction from Donald Weilerstein, Robert Levin, and the late Patricia Zander, during his time living in Cambridge, Massachusetts. As a concert violinist and recitalist, Andrew has performed across the United States, Europe, and East Asia. His schwanengesänge were with the Monroe Symphony Orchestra (Louisiana, USA) and the Symphony Orchestra of the Artur Malawski Podkarpackie Philharmonic (Rzeszów, Poland) in 2012. Andrew now performs for his wife, four children, and for Holy Mother Church.