Who is christina pluhar tarantella

Little Miss Muffet and other arachnophobes would have steered clear of Cadogan Hall for this Proms Chamber Music recital, for the ensemble L’Arpeggiata was celebrating the tarantella – the music said to cure the venom of the tarantula bite.

The power of music to heal and the history of combating the tarantula’s bite with music goes back centuries. Nicola Stigliola’s Eneide, tradotta in lingua napoletana of 1699 describes how Orpheus “dressed in a long priestly stole, raises his voice, and on the seven strings of his lyre plays now a ciaconna, now a tarantella”. In 1610, Matteo Zaccolini had written a manuscript for the Medici, never published because of its “explosive nature”, dealing with the dance of those afflicted in relation to colour and sound. In 1641 Athanasius Kircher, a German Jesuit who spent most of his life in Rome, published a treatise on illness and its cures, with a chapter on tarantismo; it seems that people react to the spider’s poison in different ways, so treatments – such as music or colour therapy – would vary from person to person. Kircher was well known to contemporary composers active at the Palazzo Barberini, including Kapsberger and Allegri. The musical examples in his treatise are the first notated tarantellas in history, founded on an ostinato bass. Unlike the 19th-century composers taken on tarantellas (think of Rossini’s La Danza), almost exclusively composed in tripping 6/8 time, these Neapolitan tarantellas vary in both mood and time signatures.

A rich and varied programme was presented by the seven instrumentalists of L’Arpeggiata, plus some vocal numbers, with some items being danced for the Cadogan Hall (if not the BBC Radio 3) audience. Sadly, only one of Kircher’s tarantellas, recorded in his treatise Magnes sive de arte magnetica, was performed, a few alterations to the published programme meaning his Antidotum Tarantulae bit the dust. A selection of tarantellas and songs were performed with thrilling, toe-tapping exub

Christina Pluhar (born 1965, Graz, Austria) is an acclaimed theorbist, harpist, conductor, and the founder of the renowned early music ensemble L'Arpeggiata.

She discovered her passion for early music while studying at the University of Graz and went on to specialize in the lute, theorbo, and Baroque guitar. She refined her craft at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague and the Schola Cantorum Basiliensis, studying under distinguished musicians such as Toyohiko Satoh, Eugen Dombois, Hopkinson Smith, Paul O'Dette, Pat O'Brien, and Jesper Bøje Christensen. Additionally, she mastered the Baroque Arpa Doppia at the Scuola Civica di Milano under Mara Galassi.

In 1992, as a member of Ensemble La Fenice, Pluhar won first prize at the Festival of Early Music in Malmö. Since then, she has been based in Paris, performing both as a soloist and as a sought-after basso continuo player in the Baroque music scene. In 2000, she founded L'Arpeggiata, an ensemble that has since gained international recognition, performing at major festivals and producing acclaimed recordings.

Beyond her performance career, Pluhar is a dedicated educator. Since 1999, she has taught Baroque harp at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague and regularly leads masterclasses at the University of Graz.

Discography

Albums

• 2004: Landi: homo fugit velut umbra
• 2004: Al Improvviso: Ciaconne, Bergamasche et un po' di folie
• 2004: Kapsberger: La Villanella
• 2004: La Tarantella: antidotum tarantulae
• 2005: Cavalieri: rappresentatione di anima et di corpo
• 2007: Los Impossibles
• 2009: Monteverdi: Teatro d'Amore
• 2010: Via Crucis
• 2011: Vespro della Beata Vergine
• 2012: Los Pajaros Perdidos
• 2013: Mediterraneo
• 2014: Music for a While
• 2015: Cavalli: L'amore innamorato
• 2016: Orfeo Chamán
• 2017: Händel Goes Wild
• 2018: Himmelsmusik
• 2021: Alla Napoletana
• 2023: Passacalle de la Follie
• 2024: Wonder Women
• 2025: Terra Mater

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